


Sexts, Lies, and Duo Maxwell

by IsolaVirtuosa



Series: Sexts, Lies, and Duo Maxwell [1]
Category: Gundam Wing
Genre: 1x2, Dramedy, M/M, PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-18
Updated: 2014-07-18
Packaged: 2018-02-09 09:42:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 56,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1978140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IsolaVirtuosa/pseuds/IsolaVirtuosa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Duo tries to get his life together after the war.  If only Heero would stop drunk texting him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

            “Heero’s sexting me again,” I declared with a scowl, dropping my phone on the restaurant’s checkered tablecloth in annoyance.

            Quatre gave me a sympathetic look while Trowa sat there looking amused and Wufei almost fell out of his seat.

            “Yuy’s _w-what_?!” he sputtered.

            “It’s a portmanteau of sex and texting,” Trowa stated matter-of-factly, lifting up his coffee and pressing it to his lips.

            “I am aware of the meaning of the word,” Wufei said, giving Trowa what others might call a glare but that I definitely called a pout.

            “Firsthand experience?” Quatre asked casually.

            Wufei started sputtering again.

            Usually I would be an enthusiastic participant in the Wufei teasing, but I was feeling more like crawling into a hole and dying.  Well, okay, that was a bit of an exaggeration, but there was nothing in the world more depressing than Heero Yuy.  Especially when he was sexting me.

            My phone buzzed again, letting me know I had another text.  I glared at it, willing it to spontaneously combust.

            Without a word, Trowa snatched my phone from in front of me and started reading the message.

            “Hey!” I cried, scrambling halfway across the table in attempt to get it back.

            Trowa just leaned slightly to the right, his long limbs easily keeping the phone out of reach.

            Quatre leaned over Trowa’s shoulder, reading along with him.

            “Wow,” said Trowa.

            “Heero seriously gets people to sleep with him like this?” Quatre asked, wrinkling his nose as he read.  What sort of gem had Heero sent this time?  Was it one of his clinical states-the-facts-clearly sexts or one of his more artistic ones?  Throbbing cocks, quivering holes?  The possibilities were endless.

            “He’s got a new twink for every day of the week,” I said, sinking back into my seat since it was clear Trowa wasn’t going to return my phone until he was done with it.

            “Is he trying to start something with you again?” Wufei asked softly, setting his hand on my shoulder.  Leave it to Wufei to take something I wanted to treat as a joke and make it serious.  Of course, he was actually there for the Why Heero and I Will Never Get Back Together… incident.  It kind of ended with Wufei pointing a gun at Heero, so yeah…  Even though it hadn’t really been Heero’s fault, Wufei just got this bizarre protective streak whenever there was even a hint of impropriety on Heero’s behalf towards me.

            “It’s a mistake,” I said waving it off.  “He’s probably drunk off his ass, and he goes into his recent contacts on his phone and accidently picks my name instead of his latest conquest’s.”

            Wufei was frowning.  I rarely brought up Heero in front of him, and hadn’t really meant to today, but the accidental texts had started to really get to me.  Reading a message from Heero telling me how he wanted to run his tongue over every inch of my body was uncomfortable in a multitude of ways, the least of which not being the fact that I was completely in love with the guy.

            Ah, Heero Yuy.  Possibly the most gorgeous man I had ever seen in my life.  He was all tousled brown hair and almond-shaped blue eyes and perfectly chiseled muscles covered in crisscrossing white scars.  I loved his scars, had touched every single one of them and knew every story they had to tell.  He’d shown them all to me in the cabin, bared his very soul to me.  Then I went and ruined everything by bringing him back to civilization.

Life had been much simpler in the cabin.

Trowa was typing away furiously into my phone and it was making me nervous.

“Whacha writin’ there, Tro?” I asked.

            “I was just telling Mr. Yuy that while his advances are quite darling, I have found myself otherwise occupied by two incredibly attractive, intelligent-” Trowa began.

            “You should add sexy,” Quatre put in.  “And virile.  Definitely put in virile.”

            “Okay,” Trowa said, fingers dancing over the screen of my phone.  “Two incredibly attractive, intelligent, sexy, and exponentially virile men.  So I will not be requiring his company this evening.”

            “I like the ‘exponentially’,” Quatre said, grinning at Trowa.

            “I thought it really highlighted how virile we truly are,” Trowa said agreeably.  He pressed one more button, then said, “Sent.”

            “I’m glad you two think so highly of yourselves,” I said, holding my hand out for the return of my phone.

            Trowa dutifully placed it in my hand.

            I didn’t mind that he had sent it, since I would have sent something equally snarky and smartassed, and Trowa had just saved me the trouble of thinking of something that both conveyed how much I didn’t care that Heero was mistakenly sending me illicit text messages and also how clever and witty I was.

            My phone buzzed again.  I opened the message and felt my eye twitch.

            ‘Can I join?’ came Heero’s reply.

            I glared at the phone, angrily typing my answer.

            ‘Heero, this is Duo you dumbass.’

            ‘Oh.’

            There was a pause, then my phone buzzed again.

            ‘Are you really having a threesome, or did Trowa and Quatre just write all that about themselves?’

            I couldn’t help but smile, but I closed the message and decided not to answer it.  Heero was still on top of things, even completely wasted.  Except when it came to selecting email addresses on his phone, but whatever.

            Wufei was still frowning.

            “It’s not a big deal, Chang,” I said, poking him in the side.

            He glared at my finger like it had personally affronted him.

            I poked him again, just to make him madder.  “Haven’t been keeping up with your sit ups, have you?”

            The glare intensified.

            I grinned at him, grabbing the check from the end of the table and rising to my feet.  “Let’s blow this pop stand already.”

            The others followed me to the cash register and we doled out our money to the waitress.

            Out in the parking lot, I dug through my jacket pocket for my cigarettes and a lighter.  I offered the pack to Trowa and he pulled one out.  I lit us both up, then took a long drag.

            Quatre and Wufei were wearing their matching looks of disapproval, which were duly ignored.  The two of them had ended up surprisingly normal for former child soldiers, whereas the rest of us needed our addictions to get through the days.

            “You sure you want to stay at Mr. Anti-Smoking’s mansion while you’re here?” I asked Trowa, gesturing my cigarette towards Quatre as I spoke.  “Me and Wu have a really nice couch.  It barely squeaks at all.  And the cushions are super hard, which is great for back support.”

            “Hm, I’ll think about it,” Trowa said.

            “Stop trying to steal Trowa away,” Quatre complained from where he was leaning against his excessively large SUV with Wufei.

            “Then stop hogging him,” I retorted, sticking my tongue out at him.

            Quatre stuck his out back at me.

            I turned back to Trowa.  “So come on.  Giant four poster bed with thousand count silk sheets surrounded by Arabian dancing girls or barely squeaking couch with the possibility of a shirtless Wufei?  Which is it gonna be?”

            “There was only the one dancing girl, and it was only that one time…” Quatre muttered.

            “Don’t involve me in this,” Wufei growled at me.

            “You said he’s been slacking on his sit ups,” Trowa murmured to me.

            “Yeah, but he hasn’t let himself go too much,” I reassured him.  “It’s still a pretty decent sight.”

            “Hm,” Trowa said, carefully weighing his options.

            “Trowa, let’s go,” Quatre said, pulling his keys out of his pocket and disarming the alarm.

            Trowa dropped his cigarette to the ground and stubbed it out with his toe.  “Well, I better be going.”

            “Hey!” I protested.  “We’ve got cable!  We have Funions!  And there’s barely any dishes overflowing out of the sink at all!”

            “Later,” Trowa said with a brisk wave as he climbed into the SUV.

            Quatre gave me a little smirk of triumph.

            There was another exchange of stuck-out tongues, and then Quatre pulled out of the parking space and drove away.

            “I can’t believe that Trowa would rather stay in a swanky mansion than our swinging bachelor pad,” I muttered, taking out my own keys and unlocking the doors.

            “Duo,” Wufei said, shaking his head.

            “What?”

            “Quit trying to cock block,” he said, and this time it was my turn to sputter.

            “W-w-what?!”

            Wufei grinned at me from the passenger seat, clearly pleased to have one up on me.

            “They’re not…” I started.

            “Trowa said that he’s going to say something before he goes back to the circus,” Wufei said.

            “He told you this?” I asked incredulously.  “He’s seriously going to finally tell Quat?!  Why didn’t he tell me?!”

            “Yes, yes, and because I’m a better listener,” Wufei said, looking at me smugly.

            I raised an eyebrow at him and put the key into the ignition.  “Yes, of course, Chang Wufei, great listener and not judgmental bastard.”

            “Exactly,” Wufei agreed, buckling his seatbelt with a _click_.

            “Unbelievable,” I muttered.  Quatre and Trowa had been dancing around each other since the war.  I don’t know what it was about being gundam pilots and being super gay for each other, but that’s just the way things worked out.  Of course, they were both nervous about messing up their friendship.  The thing with Heero and me probably hadn’t helped.  Also there was the whole gay thing, which for Trowa wasn’t a problem, but Quatre was a very public figure as the head of the Winner family.  Sucked.

            “I think it’s a good thing,” Wufei said.

            “Yeah,” I said softly, fiddling with the radio.  “It’s a good thing.  Probably.”

            “Duo…” Wufei began.

            “Don’t,” I said.

            “Well I don’t like whatever’s going on with you and Yuy right now,” Wufei said, crossing his arms over his chest.

            “Didn’t I just say, ‘don’t’?” I muttered.

            “And clearly I ignored you.”

            I scowled and kept my eyes focused on the road ahead of me.

            “Is that where you’ve been going all week?”

            “What, and now you’re my mother?” I asked.  “‘Don’t go hanging around with that Yuy boy, he’s a bad influence,’” I said in a stern voice that was as close to Wufei’s as I could get.

            “Duo…”

            Life had been a lot simpler in the cabin.

            After the Epyon de Telos Hostage Situation in the Sanc Kingdom four years ago, Heero, Trowa, Quatre, and I were all recruited as consulting special agents for the Preventers.  Really, that’s what it says on my W-2: Consulting Special Agent.  What the position actually entailed was that when a situation was as dangerous and as likely to cause death to all parties involved as possible, we got called in to take care of it.

            Heero was the only one to turn the position down, showing that he might have been the only one of us with any sense.  And then he disappeared off the face of the planet.

            I went on with my work on L2 with Hilde.  We had a good thing going with our scrapyard.  I was content for things to stay the way they were.

            Hilde was not.

            We had a brief… thing.  It did not end well.  I believe Hilde said that I was ‘a self-centered bastard more obsessed with your motorcycle and Heero Yuy than with your own girlfriend.’  Or something like that.  And she yelled something about PTSD and getting my shit together.  Then she kicked me out.

            I sought out Trowa, who was travelling with the circus on L1 at the time.  He got me a temporary job at the circus, feeding the animals or something.  I didn’t really do anything, and I never actually got paid, but I got to travel around with the circus for a couple of weeks, having therapy with Trowa.

            Trowa was my assigned partner when we worked Preventers shit.  His codename was ‘Pierrot’ and mine was ‘Death’.  We thought these much cleverer than ‘Water’, ‘Fire’, and whatever other lameness the other Preventers were coming up with.  We ended up getting tattoos of our codenames after a long night of excessive drinking following a mission to take care of a terrorist cell on L2.  The terrorists tested their sarin gas on some street kids, Trowa and I kind of lost our shit on them, and yadda yadda, yadda, no more terrorists.

            Trowa’s tattoo was a crying clown face on his left pectoral.  Mine was a grim reaper that covered my entire back.

            Quatre thought they were morbid.

            I was glad that Trowa was my partner, because Trowa got me and I got him.  Unfortunately, this made us terrible influences on one another.  We drank excessively after assignments, especially ones where we actually had to kill.  Good thing our assignments were few and far between.  We could have seriously fucked our livers over the course of that year.

            Anyway, having Hilde kick me out and suddenly finding myself literally running away to the circus gave me pause.

            It gave Trowa pause, too.  I think he was starting to see how fucked in the head I was, and it was like looking into a very uncomfortable mirror.

            So instead of our usual binge drinking, we spent our time sitting among the stinky animal cages of the circus and talking.

            Our current Preventers gig was not working for us.  But we couldn’t just be civilians, either.  Trowa got some release from working at the circus, and for me it was working salvage, which I’d been unceremoniously fired from, and my bike.  But we had these skills and this knowledge that just couldn’t be buried, and we needed an outlet for it.

            It’s just that all the people’s lives I had taken had really started to weigh down on me.  On Trowa, too.

            The sickest part was that sometimes we liked it.  Sometimes we took pleasure in it.  The incident with the terrorists on L2…  What Trowa and I had done to them…  But to test that gas on _children_ , it was just something that couldn’t be forgiven, and they had to pay.

            The problem with our skills was that while they were perfectly appropriate for wartime, they somehow looked dark, ugly, and out of place in this slipshod peace that we had helped to bring about.  This wasn’t the age of the gundams, it was time for the Relena Peacecrafts of the world to lead us and bring us to the next step.

            In a world where orphans were starving to death, where soldiers killed innocent people, where you had to fight for your life just to survive, what we did made sense.  In this new world, where mobile suits had been decommissioned and disagreements between nations and colonies were dealt with by stuffy men in suits yelling at each other instead of blowing each other up, we just didn’t have a place.

            Our assignment on L2 had been to stop the terrorists.  Of course we could use whatever amount of force was required, but did we really have to kill them?  As they sat on their knees, begging for their lives, one of them holding his entrails in with his bloody hands, trying desperately to keep them from spilling onto the floor, did we really have to press the guns to their foreheads and pull the trigger?  Weren’t they due a trial?  Didn’t they have the right to receive judgment from a jury of their peers?  Who were these two broken boys to judge them?

            This wasn’t our age, and we couldn’t keep on living the way we had before.

Christ, I was only 18 years old and I already felt like I had lived four or five lifetimes.

Of course, being only 18 had its own, normal kind of problems as well.  You know, outside of the ‘I might like torturing and killing assholes who hurt children but it makes me feel really guilty’ thing.

            Commander Une had helped with some of the simpler problems after we signed onto the Preventers at 17.  Things like ‘I don’t have a birth certificate or an Earth Sphere Alliance Identity Card’.  Things like ‘I don’t even have a freaking birthday’.  Things like ‘I piloted a fucking gundam but these assholes at the Department of Space Vehicles are telling me I’m too young and lacking in the appropriate paperwork to get my spacecraft pilot’s license’.

            Une got me, Trowa, and even the missing Heero Identity Cards.  That meant that our names legally became our names.  I was now officially Duo Maxwell, a real, live, existing human being in the Earth Sphere.  I even had a real live birthday.  And I could use this card to do things like pay taxes since I was now a real live existing person.  Wait, why did I want one of these stupid things, anyway?

            Well, I was finally able to officially get a driver’s license though I’d already been driving illegally for years, and Une was able to use my flight experience from the war to get me a pilot’s license, even though I hadn’t actually clocked in my flight time as an Earth Sphere Alliance soldier.

            Also, I kind of liked having a birthday, even if it wasn’t my real one.  I chose the day of the Maxwell Church massacre, the day that I became Duo Maxwell for the first time.

            Trowa decided to change his name to Trowa Bloom, since he had no attachment to the name Barton.  But among us gundam pilots, he was still Trowa Barton and probably always would be.  It just felt weird to call him Bloom (Bloomsy, however, was completely appropriate).  Catherine was thrilled, though.

            Other problems of being a teenager involved never having properly gone to school and never interacting with normal people my own age.  Most people look at me and think that I’m completely at ease with other people the way I joke and laugh with them.  Actually I just feel really awkward and uncomfortable, so I make a lot of jokes to hide it.

            Then there was the Heero Thing.  I thought Hilde was crazy for bringing Heero up when she dumped me.  What did he have to do with anything?  My motorcycle, yeah I got that.  Riding my bike was the only time I got to fly, and I needed very much to fly.  So yes, I spent more time with my motorcycle than my girlfriend.  But Heero?

            Trowa had shook his head as I ranted and raved about it.  “Duo,” he had finally interrupted.

            “And it’s not like I- huh?”

            “You…,” he paused, giving me a significant look with his one green eye, “ _do_ talk about Heero a lot.”

            “I… what?  No, I don’t!”

            Trowa continued giving me that _look_.  “Yesterday, there was a boy at the circus wearing yellow sneakers.  What did you say when you saw them?”

            “I… what, most people don’t walk around wearing freaking mustard-colored sneakers!” I had protested, cheeks bright red as I recalled myself nudging Trowa in the side and telling him that the kid had stolen Heero’s sneakers.

            “The day before yesterday, you told me how much Heero likes apples,” Trowa said.

            “He does!” I protested.

            “We were eating oranges, Duo, we were eating oranges,” Trowa said with a sad shake of his head.

            “Oranges are fruit!  Apples are fruit!  There’s a connection!” I wasn’t about to give up without a fight.

            “Remember last night when we were watching Cathy practice her knife throwing and you suddenly announced to me that Heero had once stolen parts from your Gundam?”

            “I… because there were knives… and Heero… with the killing… and I wanted to knife him… and… it made sense in my head!” I concluded with a yell and a pointed poke into Trowa’s chest.

            “Can you just admit that you talk about Heero a lot, or do I have to tell you about every time you’ve mentioned Heero in the last 48 hours?”

            “What, are you keeping a diary about me or something?” I muttered.

            “Yes, today’s entry will read, ‘Dear diary, today Duo finally admitted his deep denial and confessed his undying love for a boy who thinks that spandex is appropriate attire for fighting a war,’” Trowa said, examining the dirt under his nails.

            “L-l-l-love?!” I had sputtered.

            And then it was all in the open.

            If there was one thing we gundam pilots surely sucked at as a group, it was love.

            First there was Heero, who thought it a romantic gesture to tear up a girl’s party invitation and threaten to kill her.  Of course, Relena found it equally romantic and never tired of sharing the story with us over and over.

            Then there was Trowa, who thought that Quatre was the absolute bee’s knees, but didn’t think he had anything to offer our little rich boy blondie tycoon, so he decided to bury his feelings deep down.  He buried them so deep that everyone I ever saw him hook up with at a bar was a petit little blond with big blue eyes.  Real subtle, Tro.

            Quatre, on the other hand, had decided that for the good of his family he was going to forget the fact that he was a raging homosexual and go on every date that his 537 sisters set him up on.  This actually went pretty well since every girl wants a gay boyfriend to gossip and go shopping with.  Quatre was very popular with the ladies until they actually tried to have a physical relationship.

            As for Wufei, he was married to his job.  Anyone who expressed the slightest interest was abruptly turned down.  He needed to save the world, and that didn’t leave a lot of time for a social life.  Or so he said.  Wufei, as I would find out later, had been married and become a widower before Operation Meteor.

            And then there was me.  Little Duo Maxwell from the mean streets of L2.

            Hilde hadn’t known.  Heero knew a little, but he didn’t know the extent of it.  It wasn’t either of their faults.  I guess it was mine for not telling them, but I hadn’t really known either.

            Anyway, the point was that we all sucked at love.

            I stayed with Trowa for two weeks after Hilde dumped me.  We talked about all of this crap and got closer than we had ever been before, so at the end of the two weeks Trowa told me to stop freeloading off of the circus before he had to kick my ass, and that Wufei was looking for a roommate on earth.

            And now here I was, three years later, in a car with my buddy Wufei, going back to our apartment.

            “Fuck you,” I growled, my foot perhaps pressing a bit too hard on the gas pedal.

            “So you’re saying it’s not true?” Wufei shot back, his irritation palpable.

            “I help Heero because I’m his friend, not because I want something more,” I snarled.  “You used to be his friend, too, remember?”

            “Yuy isn’t the man I knew during the war,” Wufei snarled back.

            “Neither are fucking you!” I snapped.  “We’ve all changed!  And just because Heero had a harder time adjusting, we should all disown him?”

            “You call being a coked up manwhore a hard time adjusting?” Wufei asked with that derisive snort he does.

            I slammed on the brakes.  “Get out.”

            “Maxwell.”

            “Get the fuck out of my car before I crash it into a pole just to kill you!” I raged at him.

            “No,” Wufei said calmly.

            I wanted to scream so I did, slamming my fist into the steering wheel as I did so.

            Wufei waited.  He was used to my mood swings.

            “He’s not on coke,” I muttered.

            “He’s on something.”

            I sighed.  Couldn’t argue with that.

            Of course, it was all my fault that he was like that, so I couldn’t really blame the guy.


	2. Chapter 2

            Heero had disappeared after the Sanc Hostage Situation, much as he had after both wars.  If Heero Yuy didn’t want to be found, then no one was going to be able to find him.

            Except for one person.

            One very persistent person.

            It had been six months since I’d come to earth when I was called to an urgent meeting at Preventers’ headquarters.

            Preventers’ Headquarters Europe was not a very big place, even though it was the main branch.  There were small Preventers’ headquarters scattered across the earth sphere and the colonies, each acting independently while still having to report in to Commander Une in Germany

            I’d had a long talk with Une when I’d first arrived groundside.  It had basically culminated in my Consulting Special Agent status becoming much more literally a consultant.  It had also slowly started becoming more and more of a Monday to Friday, nine to five gig.  I consulted on pretty much everything from computers and hacking to tactics to stealth and infiltration.  This was all slowly leading up to plans for me to begin training new agents as the organization began to expand.

            But before all that, I was about to be given a very important mission.  From the former Queen of the Whole Damn World.

            “Relena,” I said curtly.

            Relena rose up from her chair and gave me a curtsy.

            She fucking curtsied at me.

            “Duo,” she said, just as curtly.

            I strode into the office and approached Une’s desk, unable to keep the apprehension off of my face as I glanced towards Relena.

            Relena and the Preveneters was never a good combination.  It usually ended in her majesty getting kidnapped and the rest of us scrambling to save her ass.

            Also, we just didn’t get along.

            “Consulting Special Agent Maxwell, I called you in today for a special assignment,” Une said.

            I raised an eyebrow at her.  She had removed me from active duty while I got my shit together, barring an emergency.

            “The assignment is from Vice Minister Darlian, so I’ll have her relate the details,” Une said.

            Relena looked put on the spot, and shifted uncomfortably where she stood.

            I stared at her expectantly.  I was kind of curious.

            “Duo, I…” she began, then her head shot up and her blue eyes met mine.  She looked resolved.  “I want you to find Heero.”

            “Huh?” I said, and I was probably making some kind of crazy face that was not an appropriate response to a foreign dignitary.

            “I’m worried about him,” she said, and she seemed more relaxed now that she had thrown me completely off balance.  “He’s been becoming more and more reclusive, and I’m afraid he’ll cut himself off from the world completely.”

            “Huh?” I said again.  “More reclusive?  He’s disappeared, I don’t think he could be any more reclusive than that.”

            She gave me a look like she was lowering herself to explain something to a child.  “I know where Heero is.”

            “But you just said that you wanted me to find him!” I retorted.

            “Well, I know his general location,” Relena said.  “I know his supply route.”

            “Look, Relena, I don’t know what Commander Une has said to you, but I don’t think that the Preventers are in the business of helping uppity rich girls stalk people who don’t want to found,” I said.

            Une said nothing, sitting behind her desk and passively watching us.

            Relena looked infuriated.  “And I didn’t know that the Preventers were in the business of hiring crass, narrow-minded assholes,” she shot back.

            I blinked.  Relena didn’t swear.  In fact, she had reprimanded me for my language on numerous occasions during the brief time I spent visiting her kingdom.

            “Actually, it’s kind of chock full of them,” I finally said, breaking the tense silence.  “I mean there’s me, Wu, Tro, your brother…”

            Relena sighed and sat down in her chair.  “Duo, please stop and just listen.”

            I was going to protest being given orders from her, but Une gave me a look and I shut up, taking the chair next to hers.

            “I didn’t want to ask you for this, but you’re the only one who can do it,” Relena said with a sigh.

            “What, all your money couldn’t find Heero’s hideout?”

            Relena was trying to stay poised, but I could tell I was pissing her off.  And I really didn’t have a good reason for it, other than I thought she was an utterly insane super stalker for trying to get the Preventers to do her dirty work and find Heero for her.

            “Agent Maxwell, I think you should listen to what Vice Minister Darlian has to say,” Une interrupted, still looking passive though I knew she was monitoring everything the two of us said and did.

            “Yes, ma’am,” I said, preparing to listen to whatever nonsense her majesty had to say.

            “Perhaps this was a mistake,” Relena said, eyeing me disdainfully.

            “Perhaps,” I agreed.

            “I just thought that you were the only person in the world who could save him,” Relena said, dealing the blow with a fierce glare as she rose to her feet.  “Commander Une, so sorry to have wasted your time.”

            I blew out a long breath as Relena turned to leave.  “Relena.”

            “Yes, Mr. Maxwell?” she said, still facing away from me.

            “Is Heero in trouble?” I asked, and I couldn’t keep the hitch of fear out of my voice.

            She turned around slowly, eyes meeting mine.  Something in her expression had softened, and I knew right away that she was responding to my fear.  “As much of a danger as he has ever posed towards himself.”

            I had to reason that one out slowly.  “You think he might… hurt himself?”

            She looked hesitant but nodded.  The fear in her eyes probably matched my own.

            It was one of the many reasons that we couldn’t get along.

            “Why me?” I asked softly.

            “You’re the only one he’ll listen to,” she said quietly.  “He respects you.”

            I couldn’t keep in my snort of disbelief.  “Heero Yuy does not respect me.”

            “I’m not here to deal with your self-esteem issues,” Relena said, some of the hardness coming back into her eyes.  “I chose you for this.  Will you do it, or not?”

            “Of course I will,” I said immediately.

            “Good,” Relena said.  “I’ll leave the rest to your Commander.  Thank you for seeing me today.”

            With another curtsy, she disappeared out of the office.

            “Christ on a stick,” I muttered, sinking further into my chair.

            As it turned out, Relena had had Heero followed after he left the Sanc Kingdom over a year ago.  She had wanted to make sure that he was safe and sound.  She had been worried when he disappeared after the Marimeia Uprising, and seeing him again had worried her even more.

            I knew right away what she was thinking because I had been thinking the same thing.  No matter when I met with Heero, he was always the same.  Quiet, focused, sarcastic as fuck, and superhuman.  But if you spent enough time studying Heero Yuy, as Relena, and… well okay as I had, too, then you could see the little nuances that weren’t apparent to others.

            During the Marimeia Uprising, Heero had been on the brink of something.  He was the same old Heero, yet something on the inside was different.  I knew that Relena could see it, too, and something happened between them before it was all over.

            Not that I was jealous or anything.  And that certainly wouldn’t explain why I was always petty and childish with the Queen of the World.

            A few months later had us all meeting again in the Sanc Kingdom.  Heero was Heero, but I could see that there was something going on inside of him.  After the situation with the terrorists had been defused, I’d grabbed Heero and pulled him out into the palace’s courtyard while I smoked a cigarette.

            My god but Heero at 17 was even better-looking than Heero at 16.

            “Is there a reason I have to supervise you killing yourself?” Heero asked blandly, crossing his arms over his chest and staring at me.

            I rested my head back against the palace wall, blowing smoke into the air.

            “Don’t want to die alone,” I said.

            “You’re not likely to drop dead from those cigarettes for at least another 30 or so years,” Heero said, studying my face intently as though he could ascertain the exact number of years it would take for me to die from lung cancer.

            “Then keep me company until then,” I said, flashing him a little smirk.

            Heero snorted.  “I’ve got better things to do.”

            “Like…?” I prodded.

            He was staring again.  Then his hand suddenly shot out, snatching the cigarette out of my hand.  “Like not watching you kill yourself,” he said has he smashed the remnants under the toe of his boot.

            “I had a good three more drags on that,” I complained.

            “What do you want, Duo?  Get to the point.”

            I sighed, staring at the ground.  “I dunno.  How’s life, buddy?”

            Heero snorted.

            I let my eyes meet his.

            He looked back at me neutrally.

            “Are you going to disappear again?” I blurted out.

            He continued to meet my gaze, and I realized that he was actually considering his answer before he spoke.

            “I’m not needed anymore,” he finally said.

            “Relena needed you,” I said, though it wasn’t what I wanted to say.

            “So I came.”

            “What, are you like monitoring her or something?”

            He didn’t answer, just gave me one of those looks of his that told me everything and nothing all at once.

            “Maxwell!  Yuy!”

            I jumped, like I had just been caught with my hand in the cookie jar.

            “Chang,” Heero said brusquely, eyes turned to the approaching Chinese man.

            “Commander Une wants to meet with you both tomorrow,” Wufei said, drawing up beside us.  “She also said to get, and I quote, ‘both your asses to a medic.’”

            “I’m fine,” Heero and I chorused.

            Wufei looked like he wanted to say something, but he kept his mouth shut.  He probably wanted to call us idiots, and didn’t because one of us idiots was Heero Yuy, Wufei’s personal Jesus.

            “What’s this meeting about?” I asked suspiciously.  “Why can’t she just talk to us now?”

            “Commander Une is handling the bureaucratic nightmare of your unauthorized, homemade bombs,” Wufei said, giving me a pointed look.

            I wanted to make a snappy retort, so I was startled when Heero suddenly spoke.

            “Duo saved Relena with those unauthorized, homemade bombs.”

            Wufei and I both stared at Heero.

            “Thanks for noticing, buddy,” I said, slinging an arm around Heero’s shoulder after finally recovering from the complete and utter shock of him saying something nice about me.

            Heero made some kind of grunt that I interpreted as, ‘sure, no problem.’

            “So you’ll stay?” Wufei asked.  “Peacecraft said that she would put you and the other two up in her guest cottage.”

            “She has a guest cottage?” I mumbled.

            “I need to get going,” Heero said slowly.

            “Heero, it’s the middle of the fucking night and you’re half bleeding to death,” I said, poking the wet, red sleeve of his Preventers jacket.  “Can’t it wait ‘til tomorrow?”

            Heero didn’t say anything.

           “Take us to the princess’s cottage,” I said.  The adrenaline was starting to fade and I was suddenly very tired.  And I wanted the last three drags from my damn cigarette.

            Heero let himself be led along with me, which was a good thing since I was pretty sure he had been willing to stay, but sometimes I get a little rusty in my Heero-ese and end up getting punched in the face for my misinterpretations.  Well, no, Heero’s not that violent.  More like a punch in the gut.  Or a gun to the head.  But today we were good.

            After one more attempt to get us looked at by a medic, Wufei passed us off to one of Relena’s servants who would take us to her delightful guest cottage.  Trowa and Quatre were already waiting in the car, while Wufei had to get back to work securing the palace and writing up mission reports.  Being an actual Preventer agent didn’t seem like all that great a gig to me.  I was more the jump in, blow shit up with unauthorized, homemade bombs, and get the fuck out kind of guy.  What the hell did paperwork have to do with saving people’s lives?

            In the car, Trowa and Heero seemed to be having an extended conversation with nothing but their eyes and subtle hand gestures, leaving me and Quatre to laugh hysterically at them.  We were tired.  And the two of them were weird.

            We arrived at Relena’s guest cottage, which could be more accurately described as a small mansion.  I wondered where the girl herself was.  I wondered if she had to do paperwork, too.

            Shit had really hit the fan when we’d tried to extract Relena from the hostage situation.  I had ended up being taken hostage as well, and had blown up a room or two to get us the fuck out of there.  Relena hadn’t actually seemed to mind at the time, had actually seemed grateful to me, but I couldn’t help but worry that when I got home I’d find a bill from her interior decorators waiting in my mailbox.

            Of course any gratitude towards me had quickly been forgotten when Heero came sweeping in to save the day.  And oh lord when he got shot.  Relena was all over that in a hot minute, wrapping her arms around him, stroking his cheek, gazing into his eyes.

            The bitch.

            And Heero gazing back at her, saying “It’s okay now, Relena,” in that intense Heero way.

            So of course the second we had a free moment I’d pulled Heero aside, hoping to have my own moment of eye gaz- er I mean uh…  I just wanted to talk to him.

            Fuck, I was so jealous it hurt.

            Now here we were in Relena’s guest mansion, sharing a bathroom.

            Heero was wrapping up his arm where the bullet had grazed him.

            “The moron barely shot me,” Heero had said, cracking me up.  Only Heero Yuy could give so few fucks about being shot.

            I had pulled off my shirt and was disinfecting a couple of shrapnel wounds on my back from when I’d shielded Relena from the blast.

            I was surprised when Heero took the disinfectant from me without a word and started cleaning my wounds for me.  It had been awkward twisting around to get to my back, especially with all the bruises on my torso from the beating I took after I was taken hostage, but I wouldn’t have thought that Heero cared.  Well, more like I wished that Heero cared but he pretty much never showed it, so I convinced myself he didn’t to make myself feel better.  Yeah.

            “Thanks,” I said softly.

            He didn’t answer, just finished meticulously cleansing the wounds before applying the bandages I had set out.

            Our eyes met in the mirror, and there it was, that sad, lost little boy look.

            “Heero…” I said, which was apparently the wrong thing to do, because at the sound of my voice he was out of there so fast I didn’t even see him go.

            I glared at myself in the mirror.  I looked pale and tired and beaten and in desperate need of a shower.

            I tugged back on my tattered shirt and went to find Heero.  There was something wrong with him, and I wanted to know what it was before he disappeared again.

            The thing with the five of us was that we only ever met up when something was wrong.  We met during the war, fought together, then went our separate ways.  We met up again during the Marimeia Uprising, fought together, then went our separate ways.  Now here we were again, repeating the same pattern.

            No matter how much time had passed since we had last met, though, Heero and I always fell into being partners like clockwork.  There is no one I would rather have at my back than Heero, and while I wouldn’t presume to say that Heero felt the same way, he had sought me out specifically as his backup on more than one occasion.  Coming from Heero, that was a freaking huge ass compliment.

            So disregarding the fact that I thought he was sexy as hell, we were partners, I cared about him, and I didn’t want him just disappearing from my life again.

            I knocked on the closed bedroom door, waiting for an answer.

            I didn’t get one.

            Quatre passed by in the hallway, toweling his hair dry.

            “What’s wrong?” he asked, giving me a friendly poke in the side.

            I cast my eyes towards Heero’s door and raised an eyebrow.

            Quatre gave me a sympathetic look, big blue eyes staring up at me.  He was the only one of the five of us who was shorter than me, and I found it extremely gratifying.  “He needs to talk to you,” he said softly, resting his hand on my arm.

            “Huh?” I said.

            “Just go in there,” Quatre said, giving me a push towards the door.

            “I’ve been shot at enough today,” I protested.

            Quatre raised up his foot and kicked me in the butt.

            “Hey!” I protested, stumbling into the door.

            Quatre grinned at me cheekily.

            “Listen, Winner-” I started, but then the door that I was leaning against opened without warning and I fell to the ground in a disgraceful heap.

            “Could you not carry on with your nonsense in front of my door?” Heero asked, glaring down at me like I was the one kicking people into other people’s doors.

            “Oh, Heero, just the man Duo wanted to see,” Quatre said with a cheerful smile.  Then he raised his arms over his head and opened his mouth in the fakest yawn I have ever seen in my life.  “Golly gee, it’s awfully late, I’ll see you two in the morning.”

            Heero and I watched him pad down the hall and enter his room.

            “Has he been using the Zero System again?” Heero muttered, grabbing my arm and hoisting me to my feet.

            “I think Quatre is just naturally evil!” I announced loudly, my voice echoing down the hallway.

            The door to Quatre’s room opened and he peeked his head out, grinning at me maliciously before closing the door again.

            “Did you see that?” I asked Heero incredulously, but he just snorted and pulled me into the room, closing the door behind us.

            “Say what you want to say,” he said, letting go of my arm suddenly like it burned.

            “I…” I started.  “Well, I don’t really know what I want to say.”

            “Then get out,” Heero said, gesturing towards the door.

            I frowned at him, giving him my best ‘bitch, please’ look.

            Heero wasn’t impressed, his glare hardening.

            I walked further into the room and sat down on the edge of the bed.

            “Sit,” I said, patting the spot next to me.

            Heero continued to glare at me.

            “Or not,” I said.  “Seriously, Heero.  Where have you been the last few months?”

            “Seriously, Duo, it’s not any of your business,” Heero responded, giving me one of those bitchy looks he had in his arsenal that he seemed to reserve only for use on me.

            “I’ve been back on L2,” I said.  “I’m living with Hilde.  You remember Hilde, yeah?  Former OZ soldier, about yay high,” I said, gesturing with my hands to indicate Hilde’s general height.  “We run a scrapyard and do some salvage work to keep ourselves afloat.  She’s got her pilot’s license from the war, but the Earth Sphere government says that I can’t earn mine from clocked hours as a terrorist.  I think that’s kind of asinine of them, but whatever.  Hilde lets me pilot once we get space side, and it feels good, ya know?  To be in space again, flying out in all that blackness.  Anyway, our business is doin’ pretty good and-”

            “I have a cabin,” Heero interrupted me.

            “Huh?” I said, so wrapped up in trying to keep the babbling going that I’d kind of forgotten about Heero.

            “I have a cabin,” Heero said.  “There is water, food, and all other necessities.  Is that what you wanted to know?”

            “I, well, yeah, sure, I guess,” I said, playing with the end of my braid.  It was kind of greasy.  “You got a cell phone?  Even Tro and Wu’ve been shootin’ me the occasional email since the Marimeia thing.”

            “No service,” Heero said.

            “What godforsaken place are you living in that there isn’t any cell service?” I asked incredulously.

            “I have all the basic necessities,” Heero said with a shrug, coming over and sitting next to me.

            “Heero…” I said.  “We miss you…”  I hadn’t really wanted to say it, but there it was.  At least I’d substituted ‘we’ for ‘I’.

            “Duo, your life is fine how it is,” he said.  “It’s got nothing to do with me.”

            Cold bastard.

            “I consider you a friend,” I said, glaring at him.

            He didn’t say anything, just looked at me.

            “What?  Say something.”

            “What do you want from me, Duo?” he asked softly, his eyes taking on that vulnerable tinge again.

            “I… I want to know where you’re going!  I want you to talk to me!  I don’t want you to disappear to east bumfuck again without so much as a forwarding address!”

            “Why?” he asked, and I would have hit him if he didn’t look so incredibly, pathetically sad.

            “You’re my friend!” I snapped, jumping to my feet.  I started pacing around the room, unable to sit still.  “I… you’ve saved my ass more times than I can count, and you’re important to me, okay?”

            “I’m nothing,” he said, his face sinking back into neutrality.  “I’m not needed.”

            “Relena needed you!”

            “So I came,” he said again, an echo of our earlier conversation.

            “And what if I need you?” I snapped.

            “Then I’ll come,” he said.

            That kind of knocked the wind out of my sails.  “You don’t even have cell service,” I protested weakly.

            “Duo,” he said, rising to his feet and padding towards me.  “Tell me what you want.”

            “I…” I started to say, but Heero was suddenly standing very close and holy fuck sexual tension.  Well, it was sexual tension to me, anyway.  Heero probably just wanted to intimidate me with his two inches of superior height or… no seriously, why the hell was he standing so close?

            “Duo Maxwell doesn’t have anything to say?” Heero asked, eyes staring into mine and there was a flicker of warmth in them.  “Should I mark this date in my calendar?”

            “Shut up,” I muttered, and my face was probably as red as it could possibly be.  I think for the first time in my life I actually felt like my age; I was a stupid 17 year old boy with a crush.  Hadn’t I wanted to talk about something important?  I couldn’t remember.

            Heero’s brow creased and suddenly there was a hand on my cheek.  “Duo…” he said in that intense way that I’d only ever heard him use to say Relena’s name.

            What the hell?  What the hell what the hell what the hell?  What was this?  I didn’t know what my body was doing as I closed the gap between us and pressed my lips to Heero’s in what was probably the most damned awkward kiss in the history of the world.

            Then Heero had his hand around my throat and I suddenly found myself pinned to the wall, gasping for breath.

            Yep.

            Most fucking awkward kiss ever.

            His eyes were completely blank as I struggled against his hold on me.  I landed a kick to his shin, and it was like the lights suddenly came on and he immediately let go.

            I choked out a gasp, heaving in air.

            “I’m… sorry…” I wheezed out, feeling so many different things at once that I didn’t know where to start.

            Then my shoulders were slammed against the wall, and before I could really process it Heero was kissing me.

            Our lips mashed together sloppily, hungrily, our noses bumped, our teeth smashed, and it was the most amazing thing to ever happen in my life.

            Heero seriously sucked at kissing.  And okay, so I probably did, too, what with never having done it before.  But I think we made up for our lack of skill with enthusiasm.

            Yeah, we were both real… enthusiastic.

            After we had perfected the art of lips moving against lips, we discovered that you could actually put your tongue in another person’s mouth, and that was a whole other kind of amazing.  All I wanted to do was explore every last centimeter, no millimeter of Heero’s mouth with mine, and he seemed to have a similar mission.

            I have no idea how long we kissed for, and the only reason we stopped was because I found myself wondering why my hand felt so sticky and warm, and the more I thought about it, the more it seemed strange even though Heero’s tongue in my mouth was just oh so distracting but seriously what was this…  “Oh, shit!”

            Heero growled, pressing his lips to mine again.

            I gasped, wanting to sink into him again, but my hand was sticky and… “Fuck, Heero, stop for a second would ya?”

            Heero gave me a very annoyed look and I couldn’t help but grin like a happy little puppy dog.  “What?” he asked, already leaning back in.

            I stuck my bloody hand in his face, stopping his descent.

            Heero blinked, staring at my hand uncomprehendingly.

            “I kind of reopened your bullet wound,” I said, gesturing towards his bloody arm.  “Sorry…”

            Heero shrugged.  “Doesn’t matter.”

            And then we were kissing again and it kind of took me a while to regain my senses again.

            “Heero!” I said, pushing at his chest to try and hold him back.  Wait, why did I want to stop kissing him again?  That didn’t seem very logical.  We were already gravitating back towards one another when I remembered why we were supposed to be stopping.  “Your arm…”

            Heero gave me this look that if I didn’t know him better I would have called a pout.  No, seriously, Heero was pouting.

            I thought I would melt.

            Christ, snap out of it Maxwell!

            “We have to bandage it back up…” I said, trying to keep my grip on reality.

            “I don’t want to,” Heero said with a frown.

            “Yeah, well, tough shit,” I said, taking his good arm and pulling him towards the door.

            “Wait,” Heero said softly, and I turned to face him.

            He kissed me softly.  It didn’t have the fire from before, in fact it was downright chaste, but it was so sweet it made my heart flutter.

            I gasped when he pulled away, and he smiled at me sadly.

            “Okay, let’s go,” he said, and we left the room and returned to the bathroom.

            Heero let me dress his wound, but neither of us spoke.  I thought I might spontaneously combust from blushing so much.  I also felt kind of shitty for clawing his wound back open, so I made sure to do an extra good job of wrapping it up.

            “Thanks,” Heero said, standing up from where he had been sitting on the closed toilet seat.

            “No problem,” I said, cleaning up the med kit.

            There was a light tug on my braid, and I realized that Heero had wrapped it around his hand.

            I stood stock still, feeling the tension in his body like it was a physical thing.

            “Thank you,” he said again, his grip on the end of my braid tightening.

            “Y-yeah…” I stammered, not knowing what else to say.

            We stood there for a moment, then he let go abruptly.  “Take a shower, Maxwell, you stink.”

            “I… what?  Hey, you stink, too!” I snapped at his retreating back.

            Heero just held up a hand in dismissal and disappeared down the hall.

            He left Sanc that night while we all slept, and I didn’t see him again.

            So I’m sure you can imagine how happy he was to see me a year and a half later, standing at the doorway of his cabin with a huge grin.


	3. Chapter 3

“Hi, honey, I’m home.”

            “Get the fuck out of here before I blow your head off.”

            I eyed the shotgun currently aimed at my brain and carefully weighed my options.

            “What, no hello kiss?”

            I had decided to go the smartass route.

            Heero slammed the door in my face.

            And people say romance is dead.

            “Heero, I’m not leaving!” I called through the closed door.

            So Heero fired a warning shot into the door.

            “I see your people skills are really improving.”

            He fired another shot.  I imagined in my head that he looked rather petulant as he did it.

            “Hey now, you don’t call, you don’t write, you make a guy feel kind of cheap and used.”

            He fired 3 shots into the door.

            I sighed, parking my butt down on the front step.  I looked out into the trees, admiring how we really were in the middle of east bumfuck.  I held up my cell phone and waved it around in the air.  No bars.

            I wondered absently if Heero would actually get mad enough to shoot me.

            It had taken me a while to track Heero down.  Relena had located the town where he came to get occasional supplies.  But his trips had become less and less frequent, and Relena was worried that he was going to stop coming at all, which is why she had called me in.

            Relena thought that Heero’s complete withdrawal from the world was not a good sign, and I couldn’t help but agree.

            ‘I’m nothing,’ he’d said to me.  ‘I’m not needed.’

            Those words just echoed over and over in my head, playing over the memory of Wing Gundam exploding and Heero’s tiny body flying through the air.

            I have a colorful imagination.

            The inside of the cabin was quiet, so I decided to lie down on the porch and take a nap.  It was a nice day out.

            I had bribed the hardware store owner to give me a call if Heero showed up.  He knew exactly who I meant when I described the slightly homicidal-looking Asian man with dreamy blue eyes.  Well I left out the dreamy part.

            I had been staying in the town for almost two months when the call finally came.

            It was kind of fun employing my entire arsenal of stealth skills as I followed Heero’s beat-up old truck out of town and into the woods.  Yeah, I still had it.  If there was one thing, and only one thing in the world that I was better at than Heero Yuy, it was being stealthy.  Mother fucker had no clue I was following him, which one might take to mean that Heero was slipping, but come on.  Heero did not make mistakes.  I was just that fucking good.

            He took a complicated route back and I lost him a couple of times, but tracking in the woods was quite simple and I was able to trace him back to the log cabin in the middle of nowhere.  I stowed my bike, then skipped up merrily to the door, giving it a hearty knock.

            Now here I was, waiting for Heero to realize that I wasn’t leaving, so he either needed to shoot me or let me in.

            Actually, Heero decided to go with option three: continue to ignore Duo and leave him outside to freeze after the sun goes down.

            God but he was still a frigid bastard.

            I smoked a few cigarettes and stared up at the stars.  It was kind of relaxing, even if it was freezing fucking cold and a homicidal Heero Yuy was lurking about 20 feet away.

            The door finally opened around midnight.

            “Duo.”

            “Hey, Heero,” I said, sitting up and giving my body a stretch.

            “What the fuck are you doing.”

            “Just thought I’d stop by and visit,” I said.

            Heero was mad.

            “You gonna shoot me or what?” I asked, holding my arms out to give him a nice big target.

            “You’re a moron,” he said, whirling around and storming into the cabin.

            He left the door open.

            I followed after him, whistling a jaunty tune.  As I closed the door behind me, I admired all the bullets lodged into the wood.  Better the door than my skull.

            “So this is where you’ve been living, huh?” I said, eyes roving around the living room.  It was completely spartan, with a couch, coffee table, and bookshelf.  Nothing else.

            “I’m going to sleep,” Heero called from the other room.  Something came flying out the door before it slammed shut.

            A sleeping bag.  How thoughtful.

            “Thanks, you shouldn’t have.”

            So my first night in the cabin was spent sleeping on the floor.  Heero wasn’t a very gracious host, not that I had expected him to be.

            I woke up to Heero kicking me.

            “Ugh.”

            “Get up,” Heero growled at me.

            “Yeah, yeah,” I said, sitting up in the sleeping bag and rubbing my eyes.  “Mornin’, Heero.”

            “Why are you here?”

            “Huh?” I said.  I was working on getting all of the straggly hairs pushed out of my eyes.  “Oh, I came to visit.”

            “How did you find me?”  He was on the opposite side of the room, glaring at me.

            “I’m that good.”

            “Tell me now.”

            “What’s got your panties in such a twist?” I muttered, undoing the tie on the end of my braid and working the sections apart.

            “Duo!” he barked at me, and I almost felt like snapping to attention.

            “Yeah, okay, I get it, chill,” I said as I finished undoing my braid.  I re-divided the hair into three sections and started braiding again.  “Relena did the legwork.”

            “Relena?” Heero said.

            God, I hated the way he said her name.

            “Yes, your beloved Relena,” I said.  “She tracked you half way across the world during the war, did you really think you could hide from her forever?”

            “Relena found me?” Heero said, sounding confused.  He still wasn’t looking at me, hadn’t been looking at me the whole time.

            “Yes, Ms. Super Stalker tracked you down to that town, and I did the rest,” I said, tying off the end of my braid.

            Heero looked flabbergasted.  Well, his eyes widened slightly and his lips parted, which was Heero’s extent of flabbergastation.

            “Heero, what are you doing here?” I asked, sliding out of the sleeping bag so I could stand next to him and try to get him to look at me.

            He ignored me.  The bastard straight up ignored me, turning to face away from me whenever I got into his range of vision.

            “Heero-”

            “I don’t want you here,” he said.  “Leave.”

            “Okay, I’ll come back later-”

            “No, I want you gone.”

            “Heero, you’re living in the middle of the woods by yourself like a crazy person,” I tried to reason with him.  “We’re worried.”

            “It’s got nothing to do with you.”

            “You’re important to me,” I said, and I barely even blushed.  Therapy with Dr. Trowa had been helping me a lot with the whole expressing my real feelings crap.

            “You don’t mean anything to me,” Heero said, and I think I would have liked it better if he had shot me.

           I couldn’t help but pull in a sharp, shaky breath, and Heero probably thought I was about to cry or something, which I obviously wasn’t.  It was just… a painful thing to hear.

            “I thought you said you’d come if I needed you.”

            “You don’t need me.”

            “I skinned a man alive just to hear him scream.”

            Heero turned slowly, his eyes finally meeting mine.

            I looked right through him, staring back with the eyes I used to kill.

            “And what does that have to do with me?” he finally asked slowly, carefully.

            “Because sometimes I think my feelings for you are the only thing human about me,” I said.

            There was a pause.

            “Really, Duo?  Really?” Heero asked, settling on looking unimpressed.

            “Nah, I’m just playin’ witchu, man,” I said, pasting a smile on my face.

            Heero fell silent again.

            “Sooo… you gonna give me the tour?” I asked, moving towards the unexplored back of the cabin.

            “I told you to leave,” Heero growled, following behind me and grabbing onto my braid.

            “And I clearly don’t care,” I said, wincing as he tugged on my hair to get me to stop.  “Not the hair, Heero.”

            Heero gave me a petulant glare and suddenly yanked off my hair tie and started undoing my braid.

            “Hey!” I cried, trying to pull the braid away from him.  “What the hell, Heero!”

            Heero gave me an unfriendly smile.  “Well, if you’re going to violate my privacy then I’m going to violate yours.”

            Why the fuck did that turn me on?  I needed a few more sessions with Dr. Trowa, clearly.

            So I stood there blushing like crazy and feeling extremely vulnerable, and every time I moved a hand towards my hair it got slapped away.

            “Are you done?” I muttered.

            “Not until you leave,” Heero replied.

            “So if I leave my hair down…” I reasoned slowly.  “I can stay?”

            “…yes.”

            I turned around, grinning at him.  “Okay, then.”  I ran a hand through the crimpy mess that was my hair.  “Looks like hell, though.”

            Heero frowned.  He knew that I couldn’t possibly be comfortable, but I was about to fake the hell out of it.  We’d actually had many an argument about the impracticality of my hair during the war.

            “It was a gift from someone important,” I’d told him, clutching the braid protectively as he held his razor up at me menacingly.

            “How can hair be a gift?” Heero had growled.

            “Because someone I loved gave me this braid,” I growled back.  “And she’s dead now, so this is all I have left of her.”

            “Your hair is a damn liability.”

            “As long as it’s in its braid its fine,” I said, tucking the braid down the back of my shirt and going back to packing explosives.  “And it will always be in its braid because I damn near feel naked with it down.”

            Why did I tell Heero these things?  I should have known he would find a way to exploit my vulnerability.  He was an asshole like that.

            I really did always keep my hair in its braid.  I undid it and brushed it to take a shower, then immediately brushed and braided it again as soon as I got out.  No one ever saw me with it completely down, and it really did make me feel exposed standing there in front of Heero with the cascades of hair flopping around me.

            “Are you really going to stay?” Heero asked, looking unhappy about the prospect.

            “You said I could,” I said, pushing the door to his bedroom open and peeking inside.  There was a bed, a closet, and a desk with a… laptop.  “You bastard, you have internet.”

            “Never said I didn’t,” Heero replied, tugging on my shoulder to pull me out of the doorway and close the door.

            “You’re an ass,” I said.  “Would it kill you to email us every once and a while to let us know you’re still alive?”

            “Would you leave if I said I would?” Heero asked hopefully.

            “Why do you want me to leave so bad?” I asked, moving into the last room in the cabin which turned out to be the kitchen.  Fridge, stove, table, one chair, cabinets, sink.  This was the most frugal damn place I’d ever seen in my life, minus the laptop.  “Got a hot date coming by or something?”

            “You…” he began, then stopped.

            “I…?” I prodded, moving around the kitchen to examine every last detail.  It didn’t take long, which was unfortunate, because I wanted to keep moving around so Heero couldn’t see how much I wanted crawl into a hole and die.  Having my hair out of its braid was just plain _wrong_.

            “You make me uncomfortable,” Heero finally said, and that got me to pause and look at him.

            “Why, cause of the Sanc thing?” I asked.  It started out nonchalant, but then I thought about _the Sanc thing_ and I started blushing.

            “It shouldn’t have happened,” Heero said, looking away.

            “Yeah, it was totally my fault,” I said, waving it off as I headed back into the living room.  “Don’t even worry about it, man, it’s not gonna happen again or anything.”

            Heero said something under his breath.

            “What?” I asked.

            “Nothing.”

            “Is that why you left?” I asked.

            “Of course not.”

            “Of course not,” I echoed.

            “Duo, can you just leave?”

            “Hair is still down,” I said, giving it a toss.

            “You obviously hate it.”

            “I could do this all day.”

            “You could not.”

            “Try me.”

            So I spent the day in Heero’s cabin, with him being an evasive asshole and me feeling completely exposed.

            And the man didn’t even have running water.  When I asked where the bathroom was, he directed me to an outhouse.  When I asked about taking a shower, he directed me to the lake.

            I found out later that he was just being an asshole, and actually had a shower setup outside that used water from his well.  But still.  No running water.

            Seriously, it was worse than Relena feared.  Heero was out of his mind.

            I ended up leaving that night to go back to my hotel in town, tying my braid off securely with threats to return the next day.

            Christ I was worried.

            I was surprised when I went to his house the next morning and he actually answered the door.  He wasn’t even holding a gun.

            He made me unbraid my hair, though.

            A typical day in the cabin involved chopping wood, going hunting, and spending hours on the laptop.  This is what Heero Yuy did 365 days a year.

            “Don’t you get bored?” I complained, hanging off the arm of the couch upside down.

            “No,” Heero said.

            “Liar.”

            Heero shifted so he could stare at me.

            I immediately flushed and moved away.

            Whenever Heero wanted me to shut up, he just stared at my hair.  It was the most effective means that he had ever come up with in the war against Duo Maxwell.

            We spent an awkward week together.  I helped him do his chores and he ignored me.  I tried to talk to him and he ignored me.  I pissed him off and he pointedly stared at me until I was so red I couldn’t take it anymore.  I went back to the hotel at night, then came back in the morning to start all over again.

            It was obvious that Heero was running away from life.  He tried to say things like he didn’t have a place in the world, or that he wasn’t needed.  The truth was, he didn’t know how to integrate himself into the world, so he was hiding in a cabin in the woods.  Heero Yuy was afraid of people.

            God I just wanted to smack him.

            After a week of the same old bullshit I decided it was time to get serious.  Also, Relena kept bitching at me about my lack of progress.

            I checked out of the hotel and loaded my bag onto my bike, heading off into the woods.

            “What’s all this?” Heero asked with a frown as I tossed my bag onto his floor.

            “I’m movin’ in, buddy,” I said cheerfully.

            “Fuck no.”

            “Too late, just did,” I said.

            “No.”

            “Yes.”

            “No.”

            “Yes, yes, yes.”

            “Why can’t you just leave me alone?!” Heero finally snapped, slamming a fist into the wall.

            “How many times do we have to go over this?” I said with a sigh.  “I care about you.”

            “I’m not worth it!”

            “How can I show you that you are?”

            “You can’t.”

            So I punched him in the face.

            Heero didn’t think, he just reacted, cracking me in the jaw.

            I fell to the floor, my vision blacking out around the edges.  “Fuuuuck.”

            “What the hell did you do that for?”

            I tried to focus on Heero’s face, eyes blinking rapidly.  He sounded kind of panicked.

            “You’ve just really been pissing me off,” I said, grinning up at him.

            “Get out.”

            “Didn’t we already establish that I’m not leaving?”

            “No, you get out of here now.”

            “What are you freaking out about?” I asked tiredly, my eyes finally able to focus again.

            “Who do you think you are, just barging into my house and acting like you have a say in how I live my life?”

            “You call this a life?”

            “Yes, I do.  This is my life, and this is how I’m going to fucking live it, so get the fuck out.”

            “No.”

            We seemed to be at an impasse.

            I decided to go outside and chill on the porch for a while.

            Heero finally came out and sat next to me after he had cooled off.

            “What can I do to make you and Relena happy?” he asked.

            “Come back to civilization.”

            “Why?”

            “So you can interact with other beings and be a part of the world.”

            “Why?”

            “Because it’s what normal people do.”

            “I’m not normal.  You’re not normal.”

            “Yes, but I look normal comparatively when standing next to you, so it’d really help me out if you came back with me.”

            “No jokes.”

            “I… yeah, okay, sorry.”

            “Does Relena harbor romantic feelings for me?”

            “Where the fuck did that come from?  How should I know, jeez, ask her yourself.”

            “Do you harbor romantic feelings for me?”

            “I?  What?  No…”

            “I thought you didn’t lie?  I’m Duo Maxwell, I run and I hide but I never lie.”

            “I… uh… hey, don’t flatter yourself.”

            “No jokes.”

            “Well why are you asking such random questions?”  
            “I’m trying to ascertain why the two of you are so obsessed with me coming… how did you put it, coming back to civilization?”

            “Look, we’re not the only ones.  The guys, too.  And even like Une and shit.”

            “Duo, I can’t.”

            “Why not?”

            Heero was quiet for a moment.

            “What if I… hurt someone…?”

            “Like how?”

            “Physically.”

            “I… don’t know.  Why would you?”

            “When we… at the Sanc Kingdom.  I hurt you.  I didn’t mean to, but sometimes it just… it just happens without me meaning to.”

            I thought about it.  “Okay, I get that.  You can’t just undo years of training.  But it doesn’t mean you can’t try, you know?”

            Heero looked unhappy.

            “Let’s go to the lake,” I said, standing up.

            Heero raised an eyebrow at me.

            “You’re tired of talking, yeah?  Let’s go for a swim.”

            “Duo, it’s September…”

            “Let’s go!” I said, grabbing his arm and pulling him along.

            The water was fucking freezing.

            Heero seemed to take great pleasure in dunking me, so I felt free to dunk him back.

            Things went much smoother when I stopped pressuring Heero.  He even let me use his sleeping bag instead of sleeping on just the hardwood floor.  And I insisted on keeping my hair braided, because fuck that uncomfortable shit.

            In exchange, I stopped asking him why he was here and why he wouldn’t come back with me, and I just fell into a daily routine with him.

            The rustic life wasn’t exactly for me, and I made frequent trips into town for coffee and hot showers, but otherwise I found myself kind of not exactly minding life in the cabin.

            We hunted and fished most of what we ate, which was kind of nostalgic.  We went for walks in the hills, and we lay out under the stars at night and pointed out what we recognized.  Heero gave me his wireless password and I played online games on my phone while he did whatever it was he did on his laptop.

            Things got a bit friendlier.  Little pokes and touches became acceptable.  Then I had a bit of a mental breakdown and hugs became acceptable, too.  Heero held me while my body shook.

            Sometimes we talked about some deep shit.  Well, I talked about deep shit, and Heero listened.

            It made me wonder, sometimes, if the only reason I wanted Heero to come back really was for my own selfish reasons.  He made me feel better.  I could trust him.  Did I want him to come back to the world for himself, or did I want him to come back for me?

            Maybe I could just stay here at the cabin with him.  I’d never have to worry about accidentally murdering people again.  It would just be me and Heero and…

            I was getting to be as delusional as Heero.


	4. Chapter 4

Relena wasn’t happy.

            She insisted on talking to him.  I gave them privacy, going for a walk while they talked it out on the vidphone.  Heero was quiet when I came back.

            The calls became a weekly thing.  Quatre started calling as well, and I made Heero make an email address so he could exchange some emails with Trowa and Wufei.  The list of people in his address book started to grow rapidly from there.

            Heero didn’t seem appreciative.

            He always seemed tired after a long day of contact with others, so I’d bust out some playing cards or the chess set.  We’d turn off the wireless and relax.  Heero let me play music on the little radio I brought with me.  I’d sing along and he’d glare at me, and it was nice.

            The nights were getting colder, and it was more efficient to just light the fireplace in the bedroom rather than the one in the living room as well, so my sleeping bag got upgraded from the living room floor to the bedroom floor.

            It wasn’t as awkward as I thought it’d be.

            Lying in the dark before sleep took over, sometimes Heero would confide things in me.  He told me about his childhood as an assassin, or about the little girl and her puppy who haunted his nightmares.  He told me about his training with Dr. J, about his first time piloting Wing, about finding the cabin.

            I’d already bared pretty much everything in my soul to him over the course of some previous conversations that had ended awkwardly in pats on the back and hugs while I tried to get a grip.  But Heero didn’t want the same kind of comforts, he just wanted me to listen.

            So I listened.

            But when he had nightmares, I didn’t know what to do.

            “Heero,” I had whispered the first time I heard him whimpering in his sleep.  He hadn’t woken up, so I’d said it louder, “Heero!”

            He started awake and I found a gun pointed at me.

            After that situation had been defused, we started on the very interesting process of getting rid of our weapons.

            “I need my guns,” Heero had protested, caressing his Beretta like it was a beloved pet or something.

            “You do not need guns plural,” I said.

            “You have a gun.”

            “Yes, I have one gun.”

            “You have knives plural.”

            I twitched at that.  “I need my knives.”

            “I need my guns.”

            Hilde’s words about PTSD came whispering back into my ear, among other things.

            “Did I ever tell you why Hilde dumped me?”

            “Something about your motorcycle?”

            “Mm, yeah, well there was that.  And then there was this other thing.”

            “What other thing?” Heero asked, pulling the gun apart and cleaning it as we spoke.

            “Well, there was the whole ‘I pulled a gun on her’ thing…”

            Heero snorted.

            It made me half-smile, even though the memory still stung.

            “What did she do?”

            “She… touched me.”

            Heero raised an eyebrow at me, glancing up from his reassembly of the gun.

            “I…” I started, and swallowed.  I didn’t want to say it out loud.  I hadn’t told anyone about this, not even Trowa.  It just sounded too stupid.  “What I mean is she touched me… sexually…”

            Heero’s eyebrow raised up even further.  “Wasn’t she your girlfriend?”

            “Yeah… uh…”  Goddamn, why was I turning so red?  “Heero, I…  I mean, obviously I’ve never had sex, and…”

            Heero put the gun down, studying my face.  “Duo, did someone…?”

            My hand was anxiously working at the end of my braid.  “No.  I mean, not really.  But like, you know.  On the streets, shit happens.”

            Heero’s eyes met mine evenly.

            I took a deep breath.  “People tried to… do stuff to me.  When I was a kid.  I mean no one ever did, so it’s not a big deal, you know?  But, well, I don’t know…  When Hilde…  She touched me _there_ , you know, and it kind of freaked me out.  Well, more like I blanked out and the next thing I knew I had a gun pointed at her and she was pissed, like really pissed.  She was yelling about why I even had a gun hidden in my headboard, and… she was just so mad.  Anyway, the point of the story, yeah, eh heh heh, uh, yeah.  Maybe if we had less weapons, we might like… get into less trouble.”

            Heero rested his hand on top of mine.

            I chewed on my lip, staring at the table.  Heero had even built me my own kitchen chair to sit on, after many days and nights of sitting on the floor.  I thought the gesture really showed how he’d accepted me into his home, and sitting on it always gave me a nice feeling.  But right now I just felt twitchy and weird.  The whole thing with Hilde, and really just anything having to do with sex, gave me anxiety.

            “No one hurt you?” Heero asked softly.

            I shook my head vigorously.  “No, no, no.”

            He squeezed my hand gently before pulling away.  “I’m not getting rid of all of my guns.  And we need the crossbow for hunting.”

            I reached into my hair, pulling out a hidden knife in my braid.  Then I went for the ankle holster and the sleeve holster.

            I immediately felt naked.  It was like taking my damn hair down.

            “Not so damn easy, is it?” Heero said with a smirk.

            “Hey, I’m doing it, aren’t I?”

            “Oh, then I’ll take them,” Heero said, scooping up my knives.

            “No!” I snapped, reaching for them.

            Heero grinned at me.

            “Asshole,” I muttered, taking the knives back and laying them on the table in front of me.  “God, we’re so fucked in the head.”

            “What’s wrong with needing weapons?”

            “The war is over.”

            “What if… we’re attacked?”

            “Why would we be attacked, Heero?”

            “Another Marimeia, another Epyon de Telos.”

            I sighed, picking up my hair knife.  It was small and the sheath slid under the start of my braid.  “I don’t want to hurt you.”

            “I doubt you could get me with a knife, I’m faster than you,” Heero said matter-of-factly.

            “You want to try me?” I asked, feeling challenged.

            And then before I knew what was happening, Heero was on the table, snatching the knives away.

            I tried to protest, but Heero’s lips were suddenly on mine, rough and warm.

            He pulled away, looking confused.

            I was confused, too.

            “I don’t know why I did that,” he said softly, sliding off the table.

            I didn’t have any answers for him.

            Heero shook his head and left the room.

            It wasn’t until I heard the front door of the cabin closing that I realized he still had my knives.

            Bastard.

            He’d taken the berretta with him, but he’d left his shotgun and another two handguns, so I gathered them up with all the ammo and put them into my duffle bag.  I’d take them with me next time I went into town and get rid of them.

            We were both pretty annoyed with each other after that, but I think deep down we both knew that it wasn’t normal to walk around fully armed every day of the week.  Especially when you were living alone in the middle of nowhere.  So we each agreed that we got to keep one knife and one gun, but they had to be stored properly and not carried on our persons.  We also kept the crossbow for hunting, and various knives for food preparation purposes only.  Not bad for a couple of former terrorists.

            So what if we were both incredibly twitchy, constantly going for weapons that weren’t there?  We were making progress, really.

            Of course, that kiss hadn’t helped things any.  Now Heero was all standoffish, and I was always blushing at him like a moronic schoolgirl.

            Add to all this that winter was coming, and life in the cabin was slightly less idyllic than when all this started out.

            I was still kind of the happiest I remembered being in a long time.

            Except that seriously, this boy was out of his mind.

            “Your shower is freezing.”

            “So?” Heero said with a shrug.

            “So I don’t feel like getting frostbite just from washing my damn hair!”

            “Wash it in the sink like me.”

            “Why the hell do I have to wash my hair in a damn sink when there’s an invention in the world, perhaps you’ve heard of it, it’s called a goddamn hot shower!”

            “Then go home.”

            “Oh, you’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

            “Some days.”

            “And the other days?” I snarled.

            “I’d miss you.”

            “Oh.”

            So I started boiling water on the stove and washing my hair in the sink.  Except it was kind of a disaster.  And sponge baths so weren’t my thing.

            Then there were our sleeping arrangements.

            “It’s cold,” I complained from the floor.

            “I bought you a damn blanket, what more do you want?”

            “It’s still cold.  And the floor is hard.”

            “Sleep closer to the fire.”

            “What if there’s a spark and I get set on fire in my sleep?”

            “Just sleep in the damn bed.”

            “…where are you going to sleep?”

            “In the sleeping bag.”

            “Oh.”

            “Why, where do you want me to sleep?”

            There was a hint of amusement in his voice.  The freaking jerk was playing with me.  He was… flirting with me?

            “Shut up.”

            So I switched to the bed and Heero took the sleeping bag.  The hard, unforgiving mattress was so damn luxurious after sleeping on the floor for so long that I thought I’d died and gone to heaven.

            “This isn’t how you do laundry,” I growled, swirling the clothes around in the sink.  It had snowed for the first time and I couldn’t take my laundry into town on my bike anymore.  “Also, it’s not very sanitary.  We like wash everything in this stupid sink.”

            “This is how our ancestors lived.”

            “We’re not our freaking ancestors.  We have things called modern conveniences.  We have running water and washing machines and memory foam mattresses.  We don’t have to hunt furry little animals and spend hours preparing them ourselves.  We can just go to the supermarket and buy any kind of food we can dream of.  It’s kind of amazing.”

            “You complain too much.”

            “You don’t complain enough.”

            “I have everything I need.”

            “Heero, you have enough to survive.  But you definitely don’t have enough to live.”

            “Are you trying to be deep?  It’s not your strong point.”

            “I hate you.”

            Despite all the bickering, we were actually getting along pretty well.  I just didn’t feel like roughing it in the woods all winter.  Plus there was the added pressure of Relena mocking my inability to complete the mission, and Une was bitching at me to be back on the job by January to train the new recruits.  Wufei had started complaining to me that when he’d agreed to me being his roommate, he’d expected me to actually live with him, and Trowa was telling me I made a shitty partner when I spent all of my time shacked up in the woods with my lover instead of getting shitfaced with him.  Quatre was actually trying to come and visit the cabin, which usually resulted in Heero hanging up the call in a huff.

            I didn’t think I was ever going to leave the cabin with Heero, and then one day he shocked the hell out of me.

            “I’m going to get some supplies in town,” Heero announced at breakfast one morning.

            “Really?” I asked, perking up.  “Mr. Self-Sufficient I Can Rough It in the Woods is actually gonna go and buy supplies?”

            “They’re not for me,” he said, rolling his eyes.

            “Then who’re they for?” I asked, crunching on my cornflakes loudly.  I sure wished we had some milk up in this cabin.

            “For the princess,” Heero said snidely.

            “Relena’s coming?” I asked, and I just about fell out of my seat.

            “No, Duo, Relena is not coming.”

            “Then who’s the… did you just call me a princess?”

            “You catch on quick.”

            “Jerk.  When are you going?”

            “Whenever you want to go.”

            “I get to come? “

            Heero just stared at me.

            “Let’s go after we do the dishes,” I said, picking up my bowl and shoveling the cereal into my mouth.

            So we set off into town in Heero’s pickup truck.  The trip usually took a little more than an hour, but with the snow and Heero’s old man driving it took closer to two.

            I didn’t mind.

            Heero was quiet, which wasn’t anything new, while I had my feet kicked up on the dash as I sang along with the radio.  He even let me smoke a couple of cigarettes as long as I kept the window open.  That was pretty momentous since he made me go outside to smoke at the house.

            “Duo…”

            “Mm?”

            “I have a confession to make.”

            I side-eyed him, wondering why he looked so guilty.

            “I…”

            “Yes?”  I think Heero hates it when I prod him like that, but oh well.

            “I’m armed,” he finally breathed out.

            I had to think about that one.  “You brought a gun?”

            “It’s in my back holster.”

            I looked at his winter coat.  I had thought it odd that Heero was dressing appropriately for the weather.  So he’d worn the coat to hide the gun.

            Scattered farms were beginning to appear on the horizon, and soon we would be in town.

            “Are you… disappointed?” he asked slowly.

            “No,” I said.  “Actually, it’s kind of cute.”

            Heero turned to glare at me before his eyes flicked quickly back to the road.

            “Were you worrying about it the whole drive?” I asked, resting my hand on his arm.  I could feel the tension thrumming through him.

            “I know you want me to act normal, but I can’t,” he said.

            “It’s okay,” I said, giving his arm a little squeeze.  “Now that you mention it, I feel kind of naked.”  My hand brushed over the back of my head where I usually hid one of my knives.

            Actually, now that I thought about it, there was suddenly a pit in my stomach.

            “Shit,” I muttered.

            “What is it?”

            “Well I was excited ’cause you asked me to go into town with you, so I didn’t really think about it, but now…”

            “Good,” Heero said, and he seemed to relax.

            “’Good’ what?” I asked, feeling my stress rising.  What had I been thinking?  We were going to be in _crowds of people_ and I didn’t have any weapons to defend myself with.  That just suddenly seemed utterly insane.

            “I’m not the only one who feels this way,” Heero said softly.

            I pulled out a cigarette and lit it, smoking it with one hand while I used the other to cling onto Heero’s arm.

            “What if I… left the gun in the car?” Heero asked slowly.

            “You can’t do that!” I cried, digging my fingers more deeply into the puffiness of his coat.

            “Why not?” Heero asked, and he sounded downright amused.  What the hell was making him so cheerful now?

            “Because…” I began, but couldn’t put into words why it was just a terrible idea for us to be walking around a peaceful town unarmed.

            “Relena invited us to Sanc for Christmas,” Heero said, pulling the car into the supermarket parking lot.

            “Oh?” I said.  That sounded like something Heero would hang up the phone for without dignifying it with a ‘no’.

            “I thought if we could make it through today in town, then maybe we could try going to Sanc,” he said.

            I thought I might burst into tears of joy, not that I particularly wanted to go to Sanc, but ho shit Heero might be willing to leave the cabin for a few days.  This was the greatest progress we had made since ever.

            “Hey, what do you mean by ‘if we make it through town’?” I asked, unbuckling my seatbelt.

            Heero shrugged.  “Let’s go.”

            “’Kay…” I said, following him into the store.

            Heero grabbed a cart at the entrance and wheeled it inside.

            “So what are we buying?” I asked.

            “Non-perishables.”

            “Anything I want?”

            Heero continued moving his way into the store, past the fresh produce.

            “Hey, let’s get some apples,” I said, pausing to pick up a bag.

            “Non-perishables.”

            “There’s like six in here, I don’t think they’ll go bad before we eat them all.”

            Heero didn’t answer and I put the apples in the cart.  Heero loved fresh fruit as much as any colony-born kid did.  It was one of the few things we could agree on in life, even if he was being dumb at the moment.

            I got to stock up on cereal, canned goods, and snacks, while Heero pushed the cart around the store for me like a good wifey.  I could get used to this.

            I never asked Heero where he got his money from, but when it was time to pay for things he would always produce his mysterious credit card that never seemed to run out of money.

            I hummed to myself as we carried the bags to the car.  Next stop was the drugstore to buy all my important hair care products.  Heero stuck close to me, seeming annoyed by how long I took to choose.  He also seemed especially annoyed at any person who dared shop in the same aisle as us.

            We loaded everything into the passenger seat and I sat in the middle.  Heero drove us down the road and pulled into a small diner’s parking lot.

            I was pleased.  Sometimes it was nice to eat out.  And drink unlimited coffee.

            Heero kept his back to the wall and his eyes on the door.

            I sat next to him, half doing the same while I savored my coffee.

            Heero got kind of pissy when I was being friendly with the waitress, death glaring at her every time she brought me more coffee.

            It made me feel all warm and gooey inside, even if my coffee refills started to taper off.

            “Do you have to flirt with everyone?” Heero asked as we got back into the truck.

            “Flirt?  I wasn’t flirting.”

            “Yeah, really?  With the eyes and the sexy grinning?”

          I bit my lip, feeling my face go involuntarily red.  “Sexy?  I didn’t know that word was in your vocabulary…”

            He turned his eyes on me and I felt like I was going to explode.

            It was a very… adult look.  The kind of look a man gave to someone he was planning on doing very… adult things with.

            Then he started the car and we were on the move again.

            This time we pulled up at a department store.

            “I’m going to leave my gun in the car,” Heero said.

            “Huh?” I said, pulling myself out of a daydream about Heero’s mouth.  “Wait, what?  Seriously?”

            Heero shifted the gun and holster from under his coat and put it into the glove box, locking it with a key.  He looked tense.

            “Heero, are you sure?”

            “Yes.”

            I eyed the glove box nervously.

            Heero got out of the car.

            I followed him out, taking up the rear since Heero was clearly running point.

            “I liked it better when you had a gun,” I informed him.

          “You’re the one who told me to stop carrying,” he hissed at me.  “See if I ever buy you a coffee maker again.”

            “You’re buying me a coffee maker?” I asked, and despite my nerves I felt a surge of delight.

            “Yeah, so watch my back.”

            I bit back a laugh.  How many gundam pilots does it take to buy a coffee maker?

            Heero seemed to scare off anyone who dared to look at him, and we somehow made it to the coffee maker section alive.

            God but this was the most stressful trip to the store ever.  At least the coffee makers were sexy.

            “This one,” I said, pointing out my choice.

            “Then let’s go,” Heero said, snatching it from the shelf and moving towards the register.

            Back in the car, we both breathed out sighs of relief.

            I laughed.  “Christ, that was stupid.”

            Heero’s eyes lingered on the locked glove box as he started the car up.

            “Do you like your coffee maker?”

            I grinned at him, booping him on the nose.  “Yeah, I love it.  Now buy some running water.”

            “You’re never satisfied,” Heero muttered, wrinkling his nose.

            “No, I’m seriously really happy right now,” I said.  I was feeling kind of giddy.  It was probably the relief of surviving a deadly trip to the store without guns.

            Heero’s mouth tipped up in a smile.  One of his hands slid off of the wheel and squeezed mine.

            It was embarrassing but nice.

            “You have enough cigarettes, right?” Heero asked.

            “Yeah, I already stocked up,” I said.

            “Do you need anything else?” Heero asked.

            “Running water?”

            “Give it up, Duo.”

            “Don’t you want to make me happy?”

            “Yeah, I do.”

            “Fuck, Heero, don’t say things like that.”

            “Why not?” he asked, looking puzzled.

            “Because it’s embarrassing,” I growled.

            Heero pulled to a stop at the town’s only red light and turned to me with a grin.  “I like it when you’re embarrassed.”

            “Well that’s a pretty asinine thing to say,” I said, glaring at him through my blush.

            “You only blush for me,” he said, leaning in and kissing me.

            I think things might have gotten a little more serious if someone hadn’t pulled up behind us and started honking their horn.

            Heero pulled away looking guilty and focused his eyes back on the road.

            I sank into my seat and faced the window.

            Heero sought my hand out again and I squeezed my fingers around his.

            Fuck.  What was I doing?  I wasn’t quite sure, but it felt nice.

            Then Heero shocked the hell out of me again.


	5. Chapter 5

“Are we at… a movie theater?” I asked.

            “Yes.”

            “Is this… a date?”

            “Shouldn’t you know if this is a date or not?”

            “That’s an evasion, Yuy.”

            Heero smiled again, his cute happy smile that I had seen about never before.

            “Are you on drugs or something?” I asked.

            “No,” he said.  “I’m taking my gun.”

            “I’m okay with that decision.”

            “Good,” Heero said, unlocking the glove box and getting his gun.

            We ended up settling on a horror movie, which kept me very entertained but left Heero kind of confused.

            “But why was everyone so stupid?” Heero asked, as we filtered out of the theater.  “Why would you go outside of the house alone?  And how are you going to defend yourself with a kitchen knife if you haven’t been trained in how to use it?  Wouldn’t a gun be more effective?”

            “You’re right,” I agreed, amused.  Of course Heero would over-analyze a stupid movie.

            “And the victim’s always running while the killer’s just walking after them,” Heero said, shaking his head.  “It’s not physically possible for the killer to catch them.”

            I grinned as I climbed into the car.

            “Did you like it?” Heero asked, buckling his seatbelt.

            “Yeah,” I said, poking him in the side.

            “Good,” Heero said.  “Do you want to go home now or…?”

            “I know a good bar,” I said.

            “I’m driving…”

            “We could stay the night.”

            “Quatre said you have a drinking problem.”

            “Quatre is a bitch,” I said.  “Besides, I haven’t had a drop since I moved in with you, now have I?”

            “Quatre _is_ a bitch,” Heero agreed.

            I snorted.

            Heero turned on the windshield wipers as little flakes of snow began to stick to the window.

            “How do we get to this bar of yours?”

            I directed Heero to the edge of town where the bar was located.

            “They have good pizza,” I said as we walked in.

            We sat down at a corner table, backs to the wall.  We ordered a pizza and I convinced Heero that he should have a beer.  If he got drunk, we could stay at the lovely motel down the road which not only had beds but also had running water.

            A proper shower sounded really appealing.

            Heero eyed the drink suspiciously.

            “Have you never had a drink before?” I asked, picking mine up and downing half of it.  “Oh, god, but that feels good.”

            “Never had occasion to,” Heero said, bringing the glass to his mouth and taking a cautious sip.

            “You are the picture of manliness right now,” I said with a snort.

            Heero glared at me and took a bigger gulp.

            “It doesn’t taste that great,” he informed me.

            This was Heero’s first step towards alcoholism and drug addiction.  At the time it just seemed like hilarious, hilarious fun trying to get Heero drunk.

            The boy could hold his alcohol, even if he had never drunk before.  It probably had to do with all the drug resistance crap that Dr. J put him through, but it just made me even more determined to see a drunk Heero.

            I moved us up to shots and was starting to get pretty tipsy myself.  I was out of shape after a couple of months of clean living in the woods.

            “Duo, you’re not very good a drinking, are you?” Heero asked with an amused smile as I accidentally knocked a shot glass over and spilled it all over the table.

            “Shut up, I’m awesome at drinking,” I growled.  “You’re just superhuman.”

            “Maybe we should walk over to the hotel,” Heero suggested.

            “Not until you’re drunk,” I said, waving at the bartender to bring us another round of shots.

            “If I keep drinking, will you stop?” Heero asked, grinning at me.

            “You saying I can’t keep up?”

            “I’m saying I don’t want to carry you down the street.”

            This bastard.

            So I fed him my shots along with his own, but I didn’t see much change except that he was smiling more than usual.  And finding lots of excuses to touch me.

            Then he gave me that _look_ again, the one that sent all the blood in my body scrambling north and south, unsure of where to go.

            “Check, please.”

            We walked to the hotel, and I could walk perfectly fine by myself, thank you very much.  The snow stuck to our hair and coats, so I stuck out my tongue and started catching flakes on my tongue.

            Heero shook his head at me and I ribbed him until he stuck out his own tongue.  He looked surprised as the little flakes landed on his tongue and immediately disappeared.  He looked even more surprised when I beaned him with a snowball.

            I cracked up, running down the empty sidewalk to escape his return volley.  I finally let him catch me when we reached the hotel, finding myself tackled into the snow.  My breath went out with a gasp and then there were just lips and tongue and heaven.

            It probably wasn’t a great idea to be making out in the middle of the street, but neither of us seemed to really care.  We were two drunk teenagers doing what we wanted.

            We finally stumbled into the hotel looking a bit flustered.  The front desk worker raised an eyebrow at our appearance.  She also seemed surprised by my insistence of a twin room.

            Heero held my hand as we walked to the elevator.  Then he pushed me up against the wall as soon as the doors had closed so we could make out some more.

            We stumbled to our room and I fumbled with the key card, trying to get the stupid light to turn green.

            We both realized at about the same time that we were on the wrong floor.

            Laughing, we took the stairs up one more floor and finally got into our room.  I made a beeline for the bed, kicking off my shoes and collapsing on its feathery softness.

            “Omigod, this is heaven,” I breathed, nuzzling my cheek against the pillow.

            Heero tested out his own bed, lying on his back.  “Eh, the sleeping bag’s just as good.”

            “You’re a liar.”

            Heero grinned at me.  He looked young and happy and sweet and I couldn’t stop myself from rolling out of my bed and climbing on top of him.

            “Hi,” I said.

            “Hi,” he replied, reaching up and brushing my bangs out of my eyes.

            I smiled, touching his cheek.  He had nice cheekbones, and I suddenly wanted to trace them with my fingers.

            “You should take your coat off,” Heero said, reaching up and tugging my zipper open.

            “You, too,” I said, slowly sliding the zipper of his coat down.  It took more coordination than I expected it to.

            “Mm,” Heero agreed, sitting up and taking me with him.  He pulled his coat off and then carefully removed his holster, draping it on the headboard and checking the draw while I tugged off my own coat.

            I settled more comfortably in his lap.

            “Heero?”

            “Yeah?

            “Is this okay?” I asked, studying his face from up close.  His eyelashes were short, but thick and black and lovely.

            Heero was still fiddling with his gun, making it sure it was easily accessible.

            “What do you mean?”

            I wanted to kiss his cheek, so I did.  I could feel the up tilt of his cheek under my lips as he started to smile.

            “You should always smile,” I informed him, kissing his cheek again.

            Heero turned and our lips met.

            Was this the reason that I had been the sole survivor of all the horrors of my childhood?  So that at this one perfect moment in time I could kiss Heero Yuy, and he could be mine, and I could be his?  In my drunken state, this seemed perfectly logical, like some kind of divine plan from the God I didn’t believe in.

            “What did you mean before?” Heero murmured, resting his forehead against mine.

           “Hm?” I asked, studying the slight crookedness of his nose.  Who knows how many times it had been broken.

            “You asked if this is okay,” he said.

            “Mm,” I said, looking into his eyes.  “I don’t want you to leave again.  Like in Sanc.”

            “That had nothing to do with you,” he said, pressing in closer so our noses touched.  “I was never going to stay.”  He paused, gazing into my eyes like he was trying to see inside of me.  “You made it harder to leave, though.”

            “Oh?”

            “Yeah.”

            “Why’s that?”

            “Because.”

            I waited.

            Heero was quiet.

            “Because…?” I prodded, ghosting a kiss against his mouth.

            “Because I’d already decided who I was.”

            “Who are you?”

            “Nobody,” he said softly, sadly.

            “I don’t think that you’re nobody,” I said, pressing a hand over his heart.  I could feel its rhythmic thudding moving under my hand.

            “That’s the problem.”

            “How is it a problem?”

            “Because you make me want to be the person you see instead of the person I am.”

            My hand clutched onto his shirt, squeezing so tightly it turned white.

            “Heero…”

            “Yes?”

            “Were you thinking about killing yourself?” the words escaped my mouth, barely above a whisper.

            “I… no…”

            “Really?”

            Heero shifted, tucking his face against my neck.  “I decided not to,” he said, the words brushing against my skin.

            “Did you write up a list of pros and cons or something?” I asked, letting out a shaky chuckle.  “Reasons to live: cookie dough, rainbows, Duo?”

            “Something like that,” Heero said, kissing my neck.  “I’m sorry.”

            “W-what for?”

            “I promised you all at the end of the war that I would live,” he said.  “But the more I looked at myself, what I’d done…  I couldn’t see why a person like me should live in this world.  You all looked at me like I was a hero, but that’s not…  I can’t live up to that.  I’m dirty.”

            “No,” I whispered, cradling his head softly against me.

            “I… the reason I decided not to… it was for Relena.”

            I didn’t really know how to react to that, so I just stroked his hair and stayed quiet.

            “Her ideals… are what this world needs.  But she’s wrong.”

            “How so?” I asked, trying to keep the triumph from rising into my voice and ruining the moment.

            “Total pacifism is impossible.  Someone will always want to fight, and the pacifists are defenseless against them.  I have to fight for her.  I have to defend and protect her, and keep her ideals safe.  That’s the one thing I can do.”

            “That’s all?” I asked, tilting his chin up.

            “I never thought that I could have friends,” he said, eyes not meeting me.  “That I could have a… lover…”

            I started choking.

            “Are you okay?” Heero asked, brow creased as he patted my back.

            “Yeah, uh, just peachy,” I said, reigning in the cough.

            Heero looked at me and I could see the uncertainty in his eyes.  “Is that not what you want?”

            “Holy shit, Heero, straight from zero to 100,” I said, avoiding his eyes.  “I… yes.  I would like that.  I would like that very much.  But uh… let’s take our time, yeah?”

            “Yeah,” he said, and then we were kissing again.

            It was amazing.  It was fantastic.  It was sublime.  I thought I could never get tired of kissing Heero Yuy.

            Even now, despite what I tell Wufei, sometimes I still let Heero kiss me.  As I half drag him to his apartment in a drunken stupor, he’ll suddenly lean in and give me an insistent kiss.  And I’ll push him away and tell him that he’s stupid, and as soon as we’re inside his apartment I let him push me against the door and kiss me until I’m breathless.

            But to Heero, it doesn’t matter if it’s me he’s kissing.  Anyone would do.  So I let him kiss me sometimes, but then I put him to bed and I lock the door behind me as I leave.  Because Heero isn’t mine anymore and that night in the hotel seems very far away.

            I woke up that morning still lying on top of Heero.

            “Ugh,” I said.

            Heero’s arms tightened around me.

            “Why did you let me drink so much?” I muttered, swallowing.  My mouth tasted like death.

            “Drinking was your idea,” Heero said, his voice all low and gravelly.

            “Are you hungover?” I asked, prying one eye open to peek up at him.

            “I don’t know,” he said.  “I don’t think so?”

            “Freak,” I muttered, closing my eye again.

            “Why do people drink if they’re going to have a hangover the next day?”

            “Because it was fun at the time?  Because we can’t all be superhuman?”

            “Hn.”

            “But it was fun, wasn’t it?  Last night?”

            “Not because of the drinking.”

            “Was it because of my exceptional conversational skills?”

            “No, it was because of your exceptional tongue in my mouth skills.”

            I burst out laughing and immediately regretted it.  God, my head hurt.

            “You’ve… gotten better,” Heero said slowly.

            “What…?”

            “Well the first time wasn’t that great,” he explained.

            I opened my eyes to glare at him, sunlight filtering in through the curtains be damned.  “You seemed to like it well enough at the time.”

            “I was young and naive,” he said with a shrug.

            “You’re a little shit, you know that?” I growled, nipping at his collarbone.

            “Nnmm…” came his response.

            “Jerk.”

            “…jealous…” Heero muttered.

            “What was that?” I asked, perking up a bit.  I rested my chin on his chest so I could watch his face start to turn an interesting shade of red.  See, I wasn’t the only one who blushed.

            “Are you hard of hearing?” Heero said, frowning down at me.  “I’m jealous.  Of you and Hilde.  Obviously.”

            “Obviously,” I said, feeling a grin stretch across my face.  “Heero, why are you so adorable?”

            “Adorable?” he questioned me, looking extremely perplexed.

            “Yeah,” I said, shimmying my way up to give him a quick, closemouthed kiss.

            Heero seemed to want more, but I wasn’t about the expose him to the horrors of morning breath kissing, so I slipped away, padding off to the bathroom.  Goddamn did I have to pee.

            The pounding in my head subsided a bit, the longer I was on my feet.  I stole a drink from the faucet, and returned to the room feeling slightly more human.

            I glanced towards my unsleeped-in bed and felt kind of embarrassed.  I hadn’t meant to pass out in the middle of making out.  That seemed kind of alcoholic-y and slutty.  Duo Maxwell: alcoholic slut.  It had a ring to it.

            Heero was sitting up in bed, running a hand through his hair.

            “I’m gonna take a shower,” I said, eyeing him.  I had a sudden twinge of fear that if I left him alone, when I came back he would be gone.

          “Okay,” Heero said, eyes moving up and down my body.  What was that about?  “Can I borrow your phone?”

            “Uh, yeah, sure, it’s in my jacket pocket,” I said, gesturing vaguely around the room since I had no idea where my jacket had gone off to.

            As it turned out, Heero spent the 40 minutes that I was in the shower having a three-way text fight with Trowa and Quatre.

            Apparently Heero had been feeling very confused and conflicted since I came to live with him.  He had been on the verge of cutting himself off from the world, and then I showed up to force feed the world back down his throat.

            Then there was the other part where he began experiencing, as Quatre described it, ‘very, very homoerotic feelings’ towards me.  Apparently Heero had not even realized that he was gay before I kissed him in Sanc.  Apparently he had never even had a sexual thought in his life before that, if Quatre’s version was to be believed.  So also according to Quatre, Heero found it extremely difficult to continue on with his day-to-day life when the object of all his sexual fantasies and desires was sleeping under the same roof, leaving Heero unable sleep, eat, or breathe.

            Since I lived with the guy and had seen him sleep, eat, and breathe on multiple occasions, I found the story slightly difficult to swallow.  Quatre loves to exaggerate.

            Anyway, apparently it had been Quatre’s idea that Heero and I go on a date.  Trowa and Heero had both been opposed to this idea.  Neither of them thought it a good idea that two not-so-former homicidal maniacs start a romantic relationship.

            Quatre thought it was a great idea.  And when Quatre thought something strongly enough, you usually found yourself going along with it.

            Heero felt that the outing had been very successful, but he wasn’t sure what the outcome of it was supposed to be.

            Quatre seemed to expect wedding bells and grandbabies.

            Trowa thought that Heero needed to take a few steps back.  He didn’t think Heero was ready for relationship if he wasn’t ready enough to integrate himself into society.

            Baby steps, Quatre had argued.  Being in a relationship was the first step to coming back into the world.

            Heero had interjected that he had no interest in leaving his cabin.

            Quatre thought that was poppycock.

            Trowa could understand where Heero was coming from, but thought that if Heero had no plans of leaving the cabin, then he shouldn’t have been making out with me, thus leaving me hopelessly enthralled with the Yuy charms and unable to leave the cabin myself.

            Quatre thought it would be okay if we shacked up in the cabin and got to making his grandbabies.

            Trowa then had to tell Quatre about the birds, the bees, and how Heero did not have childbearing hips.

            Wufei told them to stop CCing him on their useless blathering.

            Quatre suggested that Heero talk to me about what I was feeling and where I thought we should go from here.

            Trowa agreed.

            Relena also agreed, but thought that Heero was definitely moving too fast.

            Heero told them all to go fuck themselves.  He gets cranky dealing with people.

            I discovered all this later, after going through my phone to find out why the hell the bill was so expensive that month.  I really needed to invest in an unlimited text plan.

            So I sauntered out of the bathroom oblivious, clean, and happy.

            “Duo?” Heero said from where he was standing by the window, looking out onto the snow-covered buildings.

            “Mm?”

            Heero held his arms out to me and I thought I might melt into a gooey little puddle.

            I happily hugged him.

            “Where do we go from here?” he asked, resting his chin on my shoulder.

            “Where do you want to go?” I asked.

            “Home,” he said softly.

            I hadn’t really thought about it, but this was probably the longest Heero had left the cabin in almost two years.

            “Okay,” I agreed, patting him on the head.  “Let’s check out and head back.”

            Heero tugged on my shirt and I continued to hold him.

            “What’s wrong?” I finally asked.

            “When we go back… when we leave here… I can’t… I don’t think it can be like this at the cabin.”

            I swallowed, but continued to mindlessly pat his head.  “That’s okay.”

            “But I don’t want it… I want you…” Heero finally trailed off into a sigh, hugging me fiercely.

            I hugged him back just as tightly.

            We went back to the cabin.

            God, things were so much simpler back then.  Sometimes I missed the cabin, lack of running water and all.  Sure, now I had my super sweet swinging bachelor pad with Wufei.  And I could pee in a bathroom without worry about my pee freezing mid-stream, which was awesome.  And I could fight with Wufei about Heero like all the time.  So great.

            “So he mistakenly sends you sexually explicit messages, gets high, and now you’re going to go and pick him up?” Wufei asked incredulously.

            “Don’t want him driving or going home with some crackhead,” I said with a shrug.  We had only just gotten home from dinner with the guys when I’d gotten a text from Heero that had me going back out the door.

            “So you don’t want him going home with himself?” Wufei muttered.

            I paused in the doorway, turning to give him a _look_.  “Seriously, Wu?  Leave the jokes to me.”

            “It wasn’t a joke,” he muttered, but he sounded petulant.  “I’m coming with you.”

            “Christ on a stick.”

            “What?  I’m coming.”

            “Whatever.  Let’s go.”

            So Wu and I trooped back into my car and started towards downtown.

            “When was the last time you even saw Heero?” I asked to break up the awkward silence.

            “Relena’s Christmas party,” Wufei responded automatically.

            “I see,” I said.  “Well, that was a clusterfuck.  You really haven’t seen him since then?”

            “Since I punched his lights out?” Wufei asked.  “No.”

            “And you thought today would be a good day for a reunion?”

            “I thought today would be a good day to make sure I don’t have to punch him in the face again.”

            “I like his face so could you please try and restrain yourself a little?”

            “Duo.”

            “Would you take away one of the few pleasure I have left in my poor, pathetic life?”

            “Looking at Yuy’s face?”

            “Yes.”

            “You really are pathetic,” he said, but the joking tone had left his voice.

            We stared at each other for a moment as I turned off the car.

            “Don’t be an asshole,” I said, unbuckling and stepping out of the car.

            “It’s what I’m good at,” Wufei said, coming up beside me as I moved towards the bar.

            “Nah, you’re kind of a kitten,” I said.  “Sweet and harmless.”

            “Don’t make me hurt you.”

            “’Kay, kitten,” I said with a grin as Wufei gave me a murderous look.

            “You shoo should jus fuuuh…” came a voice from the alleyway next to the bar.

            And there was my darling Heero, half-passed out against the wall.

            “I’m sorry, Yuy, were speaking English just now?” Wufei asked, glaring at him.

            Heero flipped him off.

            I tried not to smile.  Really.

            Wufei turned his glare on me.

            “What’re you doing out here on the ground, buddy?” I asked, crouching down in front of Heero.

            “Basurds kished me out,” Heero slurred.

            “Jerks,” I commiserated.  “You ready to go home?”

            Heero gave me a cute little nod, holding his arms out to me in a way that made me want to melt into him, but Wufei was here so I had to play it cool.

            “A little help here, Wu-bear?”

            Wufei started sputtering at the nickname while I got on one side of Heero and let him slide his arm around my shoulder.

            “Look, you came along so you might as well help me,” I said.  “I’m gonna put out my back one of these days hauling this sack of potatoes around.”

            “I’mma not potaters,” Heero protested.

            Wufei sighed his long-suffering sigh and got on Heero’s other side.  Together, we hoisted the drunken boy to his feet and basically carried him to the car.

            Heero did not want to be put in the back seat, insisting he wanted to be ‘nexshttt to Dodo’, so despite Wufei’s annoyance we buckled Heero into the front seat and Wufei got into the back.

            I kept the windows rolled down despite the cold, and Heero seemed to sober up enough to at least be able to annunciate again by the time we got to his apartment.

            “Why don’t you stay in the car?” I suggested to a seething Wufei.

            “No.”

            “Suit yourself,” I said with a shrug.  “Heero-ro, can you unbuckle for me?”

            Heero gave me a very annoyed look, then proceeded to struggle with the seatbelt and had only just managed to undo it when I had reached his side of the car and opened the door.

            ‘See?’ his look seemed to say as he gestured towards the unbuckled seatbelt.

            “I’m so proud of you,” I said, holding a hand out to him and hauling him from the seat.

            Heero stumbled out of the car and wrapped an arm around my waist, nestling his face into my neck.  “You smell nice…” he murmured, breathing in deeply.

            “Come along, Yuy,” Wufei said, dragging Heero away from me by the back of his shirt.

            Heero started drunkenly complaining, while I tried to hide how red my face was.  Goddamn if Heero couldn’t completely turn me into a blushing schoolgirl.

            “Maxwell, go up and open the damn door,” Wufei said.

            “Aye aye,” I said, scampering away.  Heero’s spare key jingled on my key ring.

            Wufei and Heero took their time coming over to the apartment and seemed to be engrossed in some sort of heated discussion up the stairs.  Occasionally Heero’s unfiltered voice would reach my ears as they made their slow progress towards Heero’s door.

            “Nunya fuckin’ business, Chang,” or “suck my dick” echoed up the stairs.

            They say he gets it from me, but I can’t take credit for half the crass things that come out of Heero’s mouth when he’s drunk.

            “Duo!” Heero called, eyes locking onto me as Wufei dragged him down the hallway.

            “Christ you two are slow,” I complained, leaning in the open doorway and watching their progress.

            “That’s ’cause Chang sucks at this,” Heero complained loudly.

            “I feel bad for anyone who’s good at hauling your sorry ass around,” Wufei said, looking pointedly at me.

            I made a face at him, but otherwise let the comment go.

            They finally made it inside the door and Wufei dumped Heero in the living room.

            Heero stretched out along the full length of the couch, his shirt riding up and his pants slung low, and just in general looking sexy as hell.

            “Let’s go, Maxwell,” Wufei said, already out the door.

            “Hold on,” I said, going over to the couch.  “You need anything, Heero?”

            He gave me _those eyes_.

            I sighed.  “I’ll get you some water, okay?”

            Wufei’s eyes followed my trek to the kitchen.

            I got out Heero’s water bottle from the cupboard, filled it with water, and brought it over to Heero as I screwed on the top.

            “Drink,” I said, handing it to him.

            Heero wrinkled his nose.  “Dun wanna.”

            “You’re a pain in the ass,” I said, pulling up the spout and directing it towards his mouth.

            Heero begrudgingly began to drink.  As long as his manservant Duo was doing all the work, he went along with it.

            This did not go unobserved by Wufei.

            After he’d drunk what I deemed to be an acceptable amount, I recapped the bottle.

            “You’re good?” I asked.

            “I’m tired,” Heero said.  “Take me to bed?”

            This asshole.  I sighed, helping him up from the couch and following behind him as he stumbled towards his bedroom.  I set the water bottle on the nightstand next to his bed.  “Drink some more when you wake up, okay?”

            Heero just stared at me expectantly, arms raised as his drunken self could get them.

            I sighed again.  Heero made me sigh a lot.  I caught the bottom of his t-shirt and pulled it up over his head.  Hello, Heero’s perfect body.  You look just as lickable as the last time I saw you.

            Heero lay down and started fumbling unsuccessfully with the button of his pants.

            I tossed the t-shirt into the laundry basket, then took over for him, fingers easily undoing the button and pulling down the zipper.

            Heero stared up at me, waiting.

            “Really, you can’t undress yourself?” I asked, eyes lingering on all those abdominal muscles more than I’d like to admit.

            “I just like it better when you do it.”

            I sighed.

            Wufei was watching all of this from the doorway.  At least he was staying quiet.

            “Hips up,” I said tiredly.  I knew the drill.  Heero knew the drill.  The pants came off and I tossed them into the laundry basket as well.  “You’re not gonna get cold?”

            Heero shook his head.  God but those boxer briefs of his were awfully fitted.

            Not that I was looking.

            Heero kicked the sheets down the bed and put his head on the pillow.

            I pulled the sheet up over him.  “Night, Heero.”

            “Night, love.”

            I twitched at that one, turning around and swiftly exiting the bedroom, closing the door behind me.

            Wufei raised an eyebrow at me.

            I had the sudden urge to cut the eyebrows off of his snide face.  Too bad I had stopped carrying my knives.  Then again, Heero had a fairly well-stocked kitchen…

            “Stop looking homicidal and let’s go,” Wufei said.

            We got back into the car and I drove us back to our place.

            Wufei kept seeming like he wanted to say something, then would stop himself.

            I pulled into a parking space and turned off the ignition.

            “Duo?”

            “What?” I asked, feeling tense.

            “I know how you feel about Yuy…”

            “I don’t want to hear it, Chang.”

            “Well you’re going to anyway.”

            I slumped into my seat, arms crossed over my chest.

            “He’s using you,” Wufei said.  “He’ll just keep taking from you until you have nothing left to give.”

            “Okay.”

            “I won’t allow it.”

            “Uh…”

            “That cur has no honor-”

            “Are you going to start ranting about justice?”

            “Maxwell, shut up and listen.”

            “I’m not listening to a justice rant.”

            “I said nothing about justice!”

            “Yeah, but when you start going on about honor, it’s only a matter of time…”

            “You know what, stick with Yuy.  I’m sure you two will live happily ever after.”

            “Thanks, Wu, glad to have your blessing.”

            “ _Duo_.”

            “ _Wufei_.”

            He got out of the car in a huff.


	6. Chapter 6

            Two months ago, Relena had held a small Christmas party at her palace in Sanc.  The guest list mostly consisted of Preventers, aside from Marimeia, crazy ass Dorothy, and Relena herself.  There were the gundam pilots, Relena’s presumed dead brother and his wife, Wufei’s partner and mortal nemesis Sally, and of course the good commander.

            It was basically a who’s who of people who have all tried to kill each other at one point or another.

            We all get along just fine now.  Mostly.  You know, with the giant exception of Wufei and Heero.

            There was the whole Wufei pulling a gun on Heero and ordering him the fuck out of our apartment that was still kind of hanging in the air between them, unresolved even after several months.  Then there was Heero’s drinking and manwhoring that Wufei found to be just about the opposite of justice and honor, which meant it was _deplorable_.

            The party was nice and low key, just a bunch of former enemies hanging out in a swanky castle with some cheesy Christmas music playing in the background.  There was a nice cheese platter going around the room, too.

            So Tro and I were watching Sally wipe the floor with Wufei at pool while we nibbled on some fancy ass cheese and crackers, making as many cracks about Wufei’s manhood as possible and in general really getting into the Christmas spirit.

          “Hey, Wu-man, the point is to actually get the balls _into_ the hole,” I said.  “In case you didn’t know the rules.”

            “Die a painful and horrible death,” Wufei growled at me, leaning against the wall and watching as Sally began sinking a series of balls into the pockets with ease.

            “Enough flirting, Wufei, try to concentrate on the game,” Trowa scolded him.

            Wufei’s face went red and he started huffing about how he was _not_ flirting with that _moron_ who happened to be me.

            He then proceeded to completely miss yet another shot.

            “Duo, you’re distracting him with your sexiness,” Trowa said with a sad shake of his head.  “Please stop.”

            “I’m just standing here,” I protested.  “I can’t help it if all this sexiness can’t be contained.”

            Sally finished sinking all the balls and turned to smirk triumphantly at a sputtering Wufei.

            “Looks like you’re doing all my paperwork next week,” she said cheerfully.

            “Like hell I am, treacherous woman,” Wufei snarled.  “You enlisted these… _miscreants_ to help you.  I demand a rematch.”

            “Anytime, anywhere,” Sally said with a shrug.

            “Hey, don’t blame us for your lack of skills,” I said.  “It’s not our fault you don’t know how to handle a stick.”

            “Like you know anything about handling a stick,” Heero said with a snort, prowling into the room like a predator.

            “Oh, Heero, you are so hilarious,” I said, leveling him with a glare.

            Heero just smiled at me, looping an arm around my waist and giving me a kiss on the cheek hello.  No one else rated a greeting.

            “Ew, cooties,” I muttered in an attempt to hide my embarrassment, pushing him away.

            There was suddenly a roomful of glaring eyes directed at Heero.

            Okay, so maybe it wasn’t just Wufei who had the problem with Heero.

            Not that Heero cared.  He continued to stand awkwardly close to me, ignoring the glares as his eyes stayed focused on me.

            I stared into his sexy eyes for a while, then, taking the hint, fed him a piece of cheese from my plate.  If my finger happened to linger on his lips and if his tongue happened to graze against said finger while this was occurring, no one really needed to know.

            Heero and I weren’t very good at breaking up.

            Dr. Trowa tells me that my lack of a family or childhood has made me very vulnerable when it comes to personal relationships.  I laugh in his face when he tells me these things, because I’m the God of Death, mutherfucka.

            But yeah.  I’m totally fucked in the head, can’t argue with that.  So maybe there’s something to what he’s telling me.  But all my head fuckery aside, the fact still remains that Heero Yuy was my first love.  My first kiss.  People don’t just get over that shit, even when they’re all normal and whatever.

            “Maxwell, it’s barely even fun to mock Wufei’s terrible pool playing if you’re not even going to listen to my witty repartee.”

            I turned to Trowa in surprise.  I’d kind of forgotten he was there.  Or that anyone was there, really, besides Heero.

            God, I told myself I’d stop doing that.

            “Look, there’s only so many stick and ball jokes I can make,” I said with a shrug.  “Have some cheese, Barton,” and I plugged his mouth with a cube of aged cheddar.  There was no finger licking with Trowa.

            “So you’re admitting defeat?” Wufei asked, smirking at me with that superior smirk of his.

            I passed my plate of cheese to Heero.  “Hold this.”

            Wufei raised an eyebrow at me.

            “Pass that pool cue this way, Po,” I said.  “You don’t need to waste your obviously superior pool skills on beating this fool.”

            “Such a gentleman,” Sally said, passing the stick to me. “So when you beat him, Wufei’s going to do two weeks of paperwork for me.”

            “I did not agree to that, woman!”

            “Chicken.”

            “Three weeks!” Wufei raged.

            Sally was grinning like the Cheshire cat.

            “Rack those balls up, bitch,” I said, chalking the end of my cue.

            “Rack your own balls,” Wufei said, concluding in some foul-sounding Chinese.

            “Okay, but only because you asked nicely,” I said, setting the balls up.

            Heero didn’t look too happy holding my cheese, but then Quatre came into the room and started talking his ear off, so I was free to kick Wufei’s ass without my overly jealous ex-boyfriend staring us down.

            Quatre was one of the few people who was still Team Heero, bless his giant space heart.  He and Relena were the ones who took care of him for that one month we didn’t speak.  Of course the second the lines of communication were opened again, it was back to bugging Duo 24-7.

            Heero needs a lot of taking care of.

            Anyway, I was no great pool player, but Wufei sucked, especially when he was mad, which was basically all of the time.  I thoroughly enjoyed pissing my roommate off while simultaneously pleasing his partner to no end.

            “Thanks, Maxwell,” Sally said, giving me a hearty pat on the back and a fresh plate of cheese.  “That was thoroughly entertaining.”

            “I’m raising your rent,” Wufei muttered.

            “Aw, don’t be like that Wu-bear,” I said, ruffling his hair.  God, it was like touching a rock.  “Too much hair product this morning.”

            Wufei’s glare intensified.

            “Cheese?” I offered, plopping a piece in his mouth.

            Wufei almost choked on it with his sputtering.

            “Duo!”

            I turned around to a glaring Heero.  “Hm?  What’s up, man?”

            He gave me a look that as a professional interpreter of Heero-ese I deciphered to mean to go over to him that he might express some kind of displeasure with me.

            Quatre had a hand on his shoulder, murmuring something soothing which he clearly wasn’t listening to.

            “You rang?” I said, coming to a stop in front of glaring blue eyes.

            “We’re getting drinks,” he informed me, abruptly standing up and latching onto my braid.

            “How many times do I have to tell you, ‘not the hair’?” I yelled at deaf ears as he dragged me out of the room.  “Let go,” I growled, grabbing his wrist and giving it a not-so-friendly twist.

            Heero turned to look at me, no longer angry and instead a kicked puppy.

            “What?” I asked, letting out a long sigh.

            “Nothing,” he said sullenly.

            I couldn’t help but brush his bangs out of his eyes.  They were getting too damn long.

            Heero bit his lip and looked away shyly.

            Ha.  It pleased me greatly that he be the embarrassed one once in a while.

            “I need a drink,” Heero said, moving towards the staircase.

            I sighed and followed him.

            Heero proceeded to get plastered and be an asshole.  Usually he was a cute drunk.  Today he was mad at me, so he was a turd.

            “Oh, look, Duo, here comes your boyfriend,” he commented loudly when Wufei came into the parlor.

            “Really, Heero, really?” I said, massaging my temple.  I had been listening to digs about my virginity, my girl hair, and my bad morning breath for the last hour.

            “What was that, Yuy?” Wufei growled, stalking over to the couch we were sitting on.

            “Don’t get involved,” I said, waving him off.  “He’s drunk.”

            “Of course he’s involved,” Heero said with a sullen glare.  “’Cause he just loooves you so much.”

            “Actually, I just care about him as a friend,” Wufei said.  “Unlike you, who treats him like garbage.”

            “Why don’t you two just fucking get married?” Heero snapped, getting to his feet.

            “Really, this is a thing?” I asked tiredly, trying to tug Heero back into a sitting position.  “Sit your ass down before I kick it.”

            “Of course you’d defend _him_ ,” Heero said, turning his venomous glare at me before reaching for his drink that I had previously taken away from him and set on a side table.

            “Whoa, no, you’ve had enough,” I said, attempting to keep him from the drink.

            I suddenly found myself being hit in the face.

            Before I could properly react, Wufei had grabbed Heero and punched him in the face.  Heero reeled a bit and collapsed to the floor.

            I sighed.  “You didn’t have to him so hard.”

            “You’re like a battered woman, Maxwell!” Wufei raged.

            “Whoa, compare me to a woman again and you’re gonna be the one getting punched in the face.”

            “Then stop defending him!”

            “Heero!” Relena cried, rushing to Heero’s side.  “What’s going on?”

            Apparently our yelling had attracted a crowd.

            “Nothing,” I said.

            “Yuy was being dishonorable towards Duo again.”

            “Dishonorable towards me?  What the fuck does that even mean?”

            “I’ll fucking… kill… you… Chang,” Heero said woozily from where he was being propped up in Relena’s lap.

            “Wow, that’s really nostalgic,” Trowa commented, sliding onto the couch next to me.  “Haven’t heard him threaten to kill someone in a while.”

            “Hey,” I said softly, leaning into the arm that he wrapped around me.  So maybe I was a little bothered by everything that had just went down.

            Trowa squeezed my arm gently.

            “Must you always fight?” Relena asked, giving Heero a reprimanding look.

            “It wasn’t my fault,” Heero whined, suddenly looking very small and fragile.

            I wanted gather him up from Relena and hold him close.

            A frown from Trowa told me that this was not an appropriate course of action.  Dr. Trowa hypothesized that Heero and I were in a codependent relationship, which was why neither of us could move on from the break up.  I just thought that no one else could understand and take care of Heero the way that I could.

            We’re not codependent, really.

            There was some kind of discussion going on that I wasn’t really listening to, then Heero was being taken away.

            “Merry Christmas…” I muttered.

            Once Heero and Wufei had been taken to separate quarters, Quatre started hovering, examining my face.

            “It’s a little red,” he murmured, poking at my cheek.

            “Probably ’cause you’re pokin’ it,” I muttered, swatting him away.

            “You realize you’re never going to hear the end of this from Wufei?” Trowa mused.

            “Oh god…” I said, swatting Quatre away again.  “He already thinks that I’m Heero’s punching bag bitch verbally…”

            “‘Punching bag bitch’?” Trowa repeated.

           “Well, he says things more along the lines of, ‘Duo, stop letting Yuy spew whatever garbage he wants at you’ and stuff like that,” I said.  “I think he’s been reading the self-esteem issue of Teen Vogue or something, because the shit he says sometimes…”

            Quatre looked intrigued.  “Wufei is reading… women’s magazines?”

            “Look, I have no solid proof yet,” I said.  “But there are just a lot of strange coincidences.”

            “Like?” Quatre prodded, sitting down next to me and sliding his arm along the back of the couch.  The back of the couch where Trowa’s arm was also located.  I see what he did there.

            “Like Allure declared long scarves to be in for this winter and all the sudden Wufei’s buying long scarves,” I said.  “Or there was this recipe for chicken marsala in Marie Claire, and all of the sudden Wufei’s making chicken marsala for dinner.  Does Wufei look like the kind of guy who even knows what chicken marsala is?”

            “That’s kind of racist, Duo,” Trowa reprimanded me.

            “I meant that he’s an ex-terrorist bachelor married to his job…”

            “Duo loves Asians,” Quatre murmured, a sly little smile on his oh-so-innocent face.

            “Don’t go spreading that shit around!”

            “I can’t believe Heero thinks you like Wufei,” Quatre said with a snicker.  “I mean, the way you two constantly fight- oh shit, you like Wufei!”

            “What?!  What the hell, Quat?!”

            “I mean think about you and Heero during the wars!” Quatre said.  “You were always sniping at each other!  Just like you and Wufei now!  And you’re a sucker for those slanty eyes…”

            “Woah, and you’re calling _me_ racist, Tro?!” I cried, poking Trowa in the arm in hope of some backup.

            “Must you be so loud, Duo?” Trowa asked.  “It must be because you’re an American…”

            “Rice queen,” Quatre said, looking absolutely delighted.

            “I’d make a similar comment about your nationality, but seriously, Tro, what are you even?” I asked.

            Trowa just gave me an enigmatic smile.

            “His first name is French,” Quatre supplied.

            “Yeah,” I said.  “He seems French.”

            “In what way?” Trowa asked.

            “You know,” I said, trying to sound threatening since I had no idea what I meant.  “You know.”

            “Touché,” Trowa said.

            “Huh?” Quatre said.

            “Can I go home now?”

            “Home to Wufei?” Quatre asked, eyebrows perking at me.

            “I don’t think there are any flights out of Sanc in the middle of the night,” Trowa pointed out.

            “I’ll walk,” I muttered.

            “So Miss Relena tells me that I missed a great fight,” Dorothy complained, sweeping into the room like the crazy ass aristocrat that she was.  “Hey, Duo, the stories of the shiner that Heero gave you have been greatly exaggerated,” she said, sounding disappointed as she leaned in too close for comfort to examine my face.

            “Sorry to disappoint but he kind of more hit me by accident when trying to obtain booze,” I said, trying to lean away from those damn eyebrows.

            “Isn’t that always the way with Heero?” she said, shaking her head.  “He threw one of Relena’s bartenders out a first floor window when he refused to serve him once.”

            “Yeah, I was there for that,” Quatre said, nodding along.

            “What?” I said, turning for Trowa for incredulous support.

            Trowa just shrugged.

            “Anyway, I’m happy to report that the shiner Wufei gave Heero was definitely _not_ exaggerated,” Dorothy concluded.

            “Like things weren’t awkward enough between them already,” I said, leaning my head back and staring at the very high ceiling.  Goddamn, Relena was rich.  This place was so ridiculous.

            “Maybe now that they’ve finally come to blows, they’ll patch things up?” Quatre said hopefully.  “Those two always seemed to communicate better through physical altercations.”

            “God, I hope not,” Dorothy said.  “Those two fighting keeps shit hilarious around this boring ass kingdom.”

            “Well, as long as my pain is entertaining to you,” I said with a sigh.

            “You are so precious,” Dorothy said, pinching my cheek.

            “And you’re a crazy bitch,” I said, wrinkling my nose at her.

            “Oh, you sweet talker, you,” Dorothy said with a cackle.  “Trying to get me into the fray of those battling for your affections?”

            “God help me.”

            “I think you two could produce very interesting children,” Trowa mused.

            “I’m going to stab you in your sleep,” I muttered.

            “Don’t think you’re going to sweet talk me into the fray for your manly affections,” Trowa said.

            “I need a cigarette,” I declared, rising to my feet.

            “Yuck,” Quatre said.

            “I’ll come with,” Trowa said, following me outside.

            It was a freezing ass winter night, and I could barely get my lighter ignite long enough to light our cigarettes.

            “Well, that was exhausting,” I said, shoving my lighter into my pocket and taking a drag.  “So how was your night, Tro?”

            “Same old, same old,” he said.  “Good cheese, though.”

            “Mm, yeah it was,” I agreed.

            “You’re enabling him.”

            “I don’t remember booking an appointment with Dr. Trowa.”

            “Lucky for you, you get an appointment anyway.”

            “Yay.”

            “Heero needs professional help.”

            “He won’t accept it.”

            “You’re not helping the cause.”

            “What does that even mean?”

            “It means you give him rides when he’s drunk, you get him up and ready for work, you make sure his bills are paid…”

            “And why would these be bad things?  Would it be better if he drove himself home when he’s smashed?  And if he loses his job, his apartment…”

            “Because it allows him to continue his lifestyle without changing.  Also, he’s being an asshole to you, and as your friend I wish you would stop letting him.”

            “He’s not… I don’t…”

            “Duo, you don’t take shit from anyone else.  Why do you take it from Heero?”

            “I’m taking it from you right now.”

            “You’re probably going to stab me in my sleep tonight in recompense.  I don’t consider that taking my shit.”

            “You raise a valid point…”

            “Try and get a little distance?”

            “Yeah.”

            “That’s all I ask.”

            “I’ll try.”

            And we can all see how long that lasted.  Here I was two months later, being blatantly ignored by Wufei as we ate breakfast together, still mad about the whole driving Heero home thing.  I didn’t see what he had to be so mad about.  I was the one who should be mad.  After we got home he basically called me a harlot and accused me of having sexual relations with Heero, which _come on_.  He knew that wasn’t true.  He knew why it wasn’t true.

            I was going to be a celibate bachelor for the rest of my life.  Kind of like Wufei.

            Ugh.


	7. Chapter 7

            My sexual neurosis started in my childhood.  There was a thing right before I joined up with the Sweepers that kind of ended in me killing a guy.  It was kind of messy and traumatizing and I buried it deep in my already fucked up psyche and didn’t think about it again until I started dating Hilde.

            We’d just been fooling around like usual when all the sudden I just triggered back to that _thing_ , and all that fear and rage that came rushing back with the memory.  I came to with a gun pointed at Hilde’s head and actual terror in her eyes.  Hilde didn’t get scared.  I think she was actually more badass then me.  So what did she see inside of me that could scare her that badly?

            What happened between me and Heero all those months ago was basically the same, except me triggering into my psycho-killer-soldier-self triggered Heero into his psycho-killer-soldier-self, and we almost killed each other.  Hence Wufei and the gun.

            Two fucked up people really can’t make a relationship work, no matter how much they love each other.

            That’s what I concluded anyway.  Heero didn’t agree, but then Heero always had to be stubborn.

            It was all my fault anyway.  I dragged Heero into all this, I introduced him to drowning his sorrows in addictions, and I’m the one who broke his already fragile heart.  So when he needed to get his ass to Preventers’ Headquarters at 5 a.m., I drove him there.  When he was a little short on cash because he’d wasted it all on substance abuse, I covered his bills for him.  And if he wanted to tell me how stupid and pathetic I was, I let him because I deserved to hear it and I deserved to be punished.

            Yes, I know how fucked up and crazy that sounds.  But I was a monster, the God of Fucking Death, and I destroyed everything I touched.  I walked around with that albatross weighing down around my neck every day of my life.  So pardon my crazy.

            It’s funny how happy Heero and I once were.  That last month we spent together in the cabin is up there with running the streets with Solo and staying at the Maxwell Church.  Of course, like with all happy memories, the horrible ending of it all always somehow blackened the memory until it became something twisted and ugly.

            We really were happy, though.  If I think about it really hard, I can see it.  I can see the way Heero smiled like a little boy, the light sparkling in his eyes.  I can hear his laugh and see the lightness of his step, like the weight of the world had been lifted off of his shoulders.

            After our little date in town, Heero and I went back to the cabin with an agreement that we were just friends when we were in the woods.  That meant that in town we were free to make out to our hearts’ content, but no kissy kissy in the cabin.

            It was Heero’s rule, so color me surprised when one morning we were just doing our usual workout together when he suddenly grabbed me, dragged me to the truck, drove us out to the edge of the woods without saying a word while I eyed him somewhat nervously, then slammed the car into park the second we had crossed the tree line and promptly deposited himself in my lap, lips plastered to mine.

            I don’t know how long we made out for, but the windows got all foggy and I was kind of in la la land when he finally pulled away.

            “Duo?”

            “Huh?” I said, staring into his blue eyes dreamily.  I was a teenager and I was entitled to be stupid.

            “We can’t work out together anymore.”

            “Huh?” I said again.  His lips were all red and thoroughly kissed and distracting.  I found myself closing the gap and kissing him again.

            Apparently I was very attractive when I did pushups, which filled Heero with strong feelings of lust that had to be enacted on immediately.  I was told to do my exercises in the cabin, while Heero went outside to work out.  It was ridiculous, but also adorable, and it pleased me beyond anything that Heero found me attractive, so I just went with it.  I also liked to watch him from the window and laugh at how stupid he looked working out in the snow.

            I always had hot tea ready for him when he came back inside.

            He still didn’t understand the amazingness of coffee, which kind of made me sad.  But he always smiled all cutely at me when I handed him his tea, so despite its inferiority as a drink, I was happy to make it.

            The nights were rough.  I’d decided to stay in the cabin until Relena’s Christmas party.  After that, I’d head back to my apartment and my life and my job, and Heero would come back to the cabin alone.

            Heero did not like this plan.

            “You have everything you need here.”

            “Running water.”

            “God fucking dammit, I’ll install running water.”

            “…really?”

            “If you’ll stay.”

            Heero only confessed this kind of thing with his back turned to me in his sleeping bag, all the lights out.  If I tried to bring it up in the light of day, he always denied it.

            Our days were mostly spent not thinking about what was coming next.  We had a lot of snowball fights, which I really don’t recommend doing with Heero because he takes it so damn seriously.  He set up booby traps in the woods.  Fucking booby traps that dumped large piles of snow on my unsuspecting self.  That’s not a snowball fight, it’s a goddamned snowball war.

            I got even by setting up a small bomb that may or may not have taken down a huge tree.  Heero barely even got hurt and was barely even mad.

            “I WILL KILL YOU!” he raged, storming into the cabin.

            “Love ya, too, babe,” I said, holding out his tea to him.

            Heero glared at me, then took the tea begrudgingly.

            I actually liked his little temper explosions.  Heero had started to show more and more emotions the longer I stayed in the cabin.  I could finally stop laughing every time Trowa told the ‘follow your emotions’ story.  Heero was finally becoming a real boy.

            It probably wasn’t a good thing to encourage it.   Here we were two years later and he had a beastly temper.  Once he started letting it out, he couldn’t stop himself anymore.  It was kind of the same with the drinking and the partying.  When he finally started doing it after repressing himself for so long, he couldn’t go back to how it was before.

            So here we were in this giant mess now, but at the time I thought Heero’s temper was adorable.  And I enjoyed sparking it at every available opportunity.

            “Duo, where the hell is my laptop?”

            “I hid it.”

            “And why would you do that?” he asked in that tight, controlled voice he used right before he exploded.

            “I was bored?”

            “Bring it to me now before I kill you.”

            “If you kill me, then you’ll never find it.”

            “DUO!”

            I scampered off into the woods before he could get his gun.

            I’d just wanted to spend more time with him, but it seemed like the plan backfired as I spent most of the day running _away_ from him.  After he had tracked me through the woods for a couple of hours, I decided his temper was sufficiently cooled to relax a bit.  It was actually pretty fun leading him through the woods since Heero Yuy was one of the few people in the solar system who could almost keep up with me.

            I’d circled back close to the cabin and was thinking I’d let Heero find me sitting in the cabin and drinking some nice coffee when he suddenly came out of nowhere and tackled me out of my hiding place in the underbrush.

            “How?!” I gasped, feeling his full weight crushing me into the snow.

            “Enough,” he growled at me.

            “Yeah, fine, fine, I’ll go get your laptop,” I said, rolling my eyes.

            “I don’t care about my stupid laptop.”

            “Uh… can I get that in writing?”

            Heero stared at me, eyes taking on that feral intensity that they only got when… we were…

            “Oh,” I said.

            “Duo.”

            Damn if that voice didn’t go straight to my groin.

            “We’re uh still in the woods…” I said slowly.

            Heero’s eyes were still screaming ‘I wanna do bad things to you,’ as he muttered, “Stupid dumbass rules…”

            He got up, heading straight for the truck.

            “I’m covered in snow…” I said, brushing the snow from my pants as best I could.  “This shit is gonna melt and then everything’s going to be wet and I hate having wet boxers-”

            “Then take them off!” Heero snapped, already climbing inside and starting the engine.

            “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?!” I shouted back, red as a tomato.  Then I chased after him, hopping into the passenger side.

            As Heero drove us through the woods, I could feel the water soaking through my clothes.  It made me a bit cranky, and I was thinking about how I wanted to just go home and change when Heero reached out and took my hand.

            Then I was puddly goo, grinning at him as he blushed.

            “Where are we going?” I asked as we pulled out of the woods and continued along the main road.

            “Town,” he said.

            “It’s kind of far…” I said, once again reminded of my wet clothes.

            Heero sped up.

            “It’s still far, even if you actually drive the speed limit.”

            Heero sped up more.

            “Heero, you’re being awfully wild today.”

            Heero squeezed my hand.

            “What’s up?”

            “You’re leaving in a week.”

            “Yeah.”

            “I want to spend more time with you.”

            “We live together…”

            Heero was quiet.

            “That’s why I took your laptop...” I said.

            “Because… you’re leaving?” Heero said, trying to puzzle it out.

            “Because I wanted to spend today with you.”

            “Then why did you keep running away?” he growled at me.

            “Because you suck at tracking?”

            “I caught you, didn’t I?”

            “I let you.”

            “You had no idea I was even there!”

            “Hn.”

            “Hn.”

            We both fell quiet and I watched the scenery speeding past the window.

            “Duo?”

            “Mm?”

            “I lo-” he began, then stopped himself.

            “Wuh?” I said, turning a deer in headlights look on him.

            “Nothing,” he said quickly.

            “Were you-?”

            “No.”

            “Okay then.”

            We were quiet until we reached the hotel.

            “You hungry?” Heero asked as he parked the car.

            “Starving,” I said.

            “Do you want to go eat somewhere?”

            “I really just want to get out of these wet clothes- no, stop with that look, seriously,” I said, glaring at Heero.  “When did you become such a pervert?  It’s annoying.”

            “I didn’t say anything,” he said, expression changing from I Want to Eat You to whiny pout in an instant.  “Besides, isn’t it normal?”

            “How is it normal?!” I cried, flailing my arms around in an attempt to confuse and distract him.

            “Because I love you,” he said, looking straight into my eyes unapologetically.

            My jaw dropped open and I just gawked at him.

            Heero immediately began to look uncertain.

            “You can’t just say things like that!” I cried, turning my usual shade of red reserved for Heero.

            “Oh…” Heero said, looking very sad.

            “No, no, no, Heero it’s good… I guess…”

            Heero looked even sadder.

            “I mean we’re _guys_ , you know, so we don’t just say those things out of the blue like that…”

            Heero turned and just stared out the window.

            “Ugh,” I said, throwing my arms around him from behind.  “I love you, too, okay?”

            “Really?” he asked, perking up a little.

            “Yeah,” I said, kissing his cheek.  “Christ, if OZ could see us now…”

            “What’s that mean?” Heero asked, tilting his head to the side.

            “Two lame boys confessing their love in a pickup truck,” I said with a sigh.  “We’re so uncool.”

            “Love isn’t uncool,” Heero said softly.  He leaned his head back against my shoulder so he could look at me.  “It’s the most precious thing in the world.”

            “How the fuck can you say that shit sober?” I blurted out.

            Heero’s brow wrinkled.  “What?  Is it bad?”

            “It’s cheesy,” I said, looking away but there was no way to hide the tomato red color of my face.  “Don’t you have any pride?”

            “Anything that makes you blush like that must be good,” Heero said, turning around and catching my face in his heads.  “I love you, Duo.”

            “Stop that,” I said, closing my eyes since there was no other way to escape Heero’s overwhelmingly sincere gaze.

            Heero’s lips pressed gently against mine.  They were slightly chapped from running around outside all day, and I couldn’t help but suck the rough texture into my mouth.  Heero made a little sound in the back of his throat, and then the truck cab was suddenly much too small.  I wanted to press my entire body against his and crawl inside his mouth, but the stupid steering wheel kept getting in my way.

            “Inside,” Heero grunted, briefly pulling away.

            I may or may not have whined in protest.

            “Go,” he said, pushing me towards my door while opening his own and striding purposefully towards the hotel.

            “Hey!” I said, but he was already gone.  I flicked my eyes to the rearview mirror.  Yeah, I looked disheveled and slutty.  I tried to smooth my hair into place and look a little more presentable.  I’m sure the permanent blush on my face would surely help my case.

            When I entered the lobby, Heero was already passing his credit card to the lady at the desk.  Good thing he brought it, because I left my wallet in the cabin.

            “So just to confirm, you’d like the double bed?” the lady said, grinning at me.

            I think my jaw hit the ground.  Dammit, it was the woman who didn’t believe me the last time we booked a twin room.  Also, Heero, bro, what are you doing…?  Also my brain died.

            “Yeah,” Heero said, tapping his fingers impatiently on the desk.  She passed him his receipt, he signed, then she gave him the room key.

            I hadn’t moved.

            “Let’s go,” Heero said, taking my arm and leading me towards the elevator.

            “Double?” I whispered.

            Heero gave me a funny look.

            We got in the elevator.  I think I was having a nervous breakdown.

            Heero’s hand slide up my arm to my shoulder, massaging.  “I wasn’t implying anything by it.  It was just kind of uncomfortable last time when you fell asleep on top of me and the only way to move you was to push you off the bed.”

            “I… wasn’t… planning on doing _that_ again…” I said slowly, calming my racing heart.  “And aw, back in the day you would have just dumped me on the floor.”

            “Yeah, I would have,” he said, smiling at me.

            There was a _ding_ and the door opened.

            Heero pointed the way to our room and keyed us in.

            I paused in the doorway, staring at the large bed in the middle of the room.

            One, I am a virgin.  Two, the last person who tried to take things further almost got shot for her troubles.  Three, Heero Yuy had at some point become a lecherous bastard.  Put this all together, and you had a very nervous Duo.  Well, then there was four.  But I don’t want to admit to my strong feelings of wanting to go at it with Heero all night, so we will discount number four.

            “I’m taking a shower,” I said, making a beeline for the bathroom and closing the door with a secure click of the lock.  Not that a lock could keep out Heero Yuy.  He was almost as good at picking locks as I was.  Well, more like I was a lock picking genius, and Heero was an abnormally strong beast who could break locks with his bare hands.

            I peeled off my clothes and dropped them on the floor, happily jumping into the hot shower.  After I had luxuriated for a while, I got out and started blow drying my clothes.  My boxers were nice and warm and not wet when I put them back on.

            Heero was sitting at the little table next to the window.  He’d changed into his spare clothes that he kept in the truck, and was currently pouring some soda into two paper cups.  There was a pizza box and paper plates on the bureau.

            “You’re a great man, Yuy,” I marveled, going over to the box and grabbing a piece of pizza, not bothering with the plate.

            “I figured you’d be a while,” Heero said.

            “Is that a dig?”

            “Probably.”

            I snorted and continued to stuff pizza in my face.

            Heero joined me, putting his pizza on a plate like a civilized person, and we sat down at the table to eat.

            I noted the gun hanging on the headboard when I went to get another slice of pizza.  “You brought your gun?”

            “Well, I was going to shoot you with it this morning.”

            I snorted, but Heero actually sounded pretty sincere.

            “So what do you want to do tonight?” I asked.  “I mean we could go to that bar again, or we could rent a movie, or- stop, just stop.”

            “What?” Heero asked, but he knew exactly what I meant.

            “You’re _leering_ ,” I said.

            “I am not.”

            “You are, and it’s fucking weird.”

            “Why is it weird?”

            “Because you’re _you_ ,” I said, gesturing wildly like that would somehow explain it.

            “And…?”

            “And until like a month ago you were an asexual creature living in the middle of the woods like a sasquatch.”

            “I wasn’t asexual,” Heero said.

            “Really?  ’Cause you sure seemed that way.”

            “I stopped being asexual that night in the Sanc Kingdom.”

            “Ah-ha, so you do admit you were asexual?!”

            “You’re cute when you’re nervous.”

            “Yeah, wait, huh?”

            “Sex is a perfectly normal biological interaction.”

            “Wa-wa-wait, who brought up the S word?!”

            “You did.”

            “I did not.”

            “You said I was asexual.”

            “I… but… that’s different…”

            “Do you want any more pizza?”

            “Yes!” I said desperately, collecting the last slice and demolishing it.  Anything to stop this horrible conversation.

            “Quatre thinks you need therapy,” Heero mused.

            “He… what?  What the hell for?”

            “He says your sexual development isn’t normal for a male your age.  Mentally.”

            “Well fuck Quatre!” I snarled.  What did that even mean?!

            “I’d rather it be me…” Heero said, looking uncertain.

            “I… was that… an innuendo?”

            “Were you this shy with Hilde?” Heero asked.

            “I’m not shy!” I snapped, face as red as could be.  “I just… uh…”

            Heero looked at me for a moment, then seemed to take pity on me.  “Let’s rent a movie.”

            “Okay,” I said, chewing on my bottom lip.  “We got pay-per-view up in this hotel?”

            Heero turned on the TV and started scanning through the pay-per-view options.

            I sat back down at the table and watched him.

            We decided on another cheesy horror movie.  I just wanted to see Heero get angry at the stupid protagonists.

            Heero dragged me from the chair to sit on the bed with him.  I flopped down on my stomach, and Heero lay down next to me, and it was nice.  I’m not really a prude.  And I wasn’t like this with Hilde at all.  I was a shameless flirt.  It was just that Heero turned my insides into butterflies.  And I didn’t want to shoot him in the head.  I had lots of reasons to be shy and nervous.

            Heero’s fun to watch movies with because he clearly never watches movies and is completely mystified by their conventions.  He also makes really dry, sardonic observations that entertain me.

            After the movie, we made out for a while, because, well, teenage hormones.  Then Heero got all sappy about me leaving, and I bitched at him to stop living in a cabin in the middle of nowhere, and then we made out some more.

            Heero decided to take a shower before bed, so I luxuriated in watching TV and enjoyed the central heating of the hotel.

            I was having a text argument with Wufei while I waited for Heero.  He insisted that since he had done all the chores around the house for the last few months, when I came back it would be my turn to do all the chores for several months.  Since he had only had to do chores for one person, I didn’t see how that was fair, but then he started guilt tripping me about being gone for so long.

            Then Heero came out of the bathroom in just his boxer shorts and my phone was tossed aside with much blushing.  Heero wears boxer briefs in case you were wondering.  I think it has to do with longing for the security of his wartime spandex.

            Heero sat down on the bed next to me and wrapped me into his arms.

            Turned out he just wanted to talk.

            “I’m scared,” he murmured.

            “Scared of what?” I asked, deciding against patronizing the great Heero Yuy who did fly into the face of all bad and evil shit without the slightest trace of scared.

            “I don’t know, maybe not scared,” he said.  “Confused.”

            “What’s up?” I asked, and couldn’t help but kiss his bare shoulder because it was there and it was sexy.  I hadn’t spent a lot of time with a shirtless Heero, and I was finding it very intriguing.

            “I’m happy.”

            “And this confuses you?”

            “I’ve never been happy before.”

            “You get pretty happy when you blow shit up.”

            “Well… yes…” Heero said.  “But this is different.”

            I held him and stayed quiet.  For the love of god, was he finally going to say he was ready to come back to civilization and stop living like a crazy person?  And maybe move in with me in a nice house with a white picket fence and a dog and make-believe 1.5 children?  I mean… what?

            “I love you,” he finally settled on.

            “Do you have to keep saying it?” I muttered, biting his shoulder.

            Heero tilted my chin up so he could look at me.  “You’re barely even blushing this time.  If I keep saying it, then maybe you’ll stop blushing completely.”

            “Good,” I said, blushing more.

            Heero looked thoughtfully concerned.  “But I don’t want that, so I guess I’ll just never say it again.”

            “Good,” I said, and of course I was lying.  I’d lived several lifetimes already, but I was still a kid basking in his first love.  I wanted to make stupidly romantic love declarations and cuddle.  Ugh, I am so uncool.

            “You flirt with everyone, you know,” he said, thumbing my cheek.

            “I do not…” I tried to protest, but I was once again obviously lying.  “Well, it’s not serious, anyway.”

            “But you only turn red when you flirt with me,” Heero said, looking pleased.

            “Are you enjoying yourself?” I asked in annoyance, still red.

            Heero nodded, not even looking the slightest bit contrite.

            We ended up getting under the sheets and curling up together, Heero laying his head on my chest.  It was painfully adorable.  I hummed a song I’d heard on the radio earlier, and Heero traced senseless patterns into my t-shirt until we both drifted off to sleep.


	8. Chapter 8

            Sometimes I liked to think about when Heero and I were happy, and other times it was so painful that I’d rather stab myself with a rusty knife.  I had a lot of memories like that.  Oh, wasn’t Sister Helen the best?  Oh, remember when you found her bloody body in the ruins of the church?

            But life’s a bitch like that.

            After dealing with a drunk Heero, then a pissy Wufei all night and all through breakfast, I was ready for a fresh start.  No thinking about the past, just a shiny, happy new day.

            A shiny, happy new day with Emo Kid Trowa standing at my door.

            “Hey, Tro, come in,” I said.

            “Oh,” he said, seeming startled that I had actually answered the door.  He looked kind of zoned out.

            “What’s up, buddy?” I asked, leading him into the living room.

            “Hello, Barton,” Wufei said as he passed through the room.

            “Huh?” said Trowa.

            Wufei paused, still ignoring me but taking the time to scrutinize Trowa.

            Trowa just stared into space.

            Wufei shook his head, continuing on his way out the door but casting an uncertain look back towards Trowa before closing it behind him.

            “Trowa?” I prodded.

            “Can I stay here?” Trowa asked softly.

            My heart did that dropping into my shoes thing.  “Of course!”

            “Thanks,” he said, going back to staring into space.

            “What happened?” I asked, poking him in the arm.

            “I told Quatre how I felt about him.”

            I waited for more.  I did not get more.  “And?” I said, poking him furiously.

            “He said… he wasn’t gay…”

            I fell off the couch.  I fell off the fucking couch in my state of complete and utter shock.  “The fuck?”

            Trowa smiled bitterly.  “That’s what I said.”

            “Do I need to tell him that he’s gay?” I asked, feeling confused.

            “I tried,” Trowa said sadly.

            “What did you say?!”

            “He said that just because he wears pink and enjoys classical music doesn’t mean he’s gay,” Trowa said.  “So I told him, ‘no, it’s the liking men part that makes you gay.’”

            I stifled back a laugh because Trowa looked so sad and we needed to be serious.

            “And then he kicked me out,” Trowa concluded.

            “Jesus,” I said.

            “Yeah.”

            “Is this a hugging moment?” I asked.

            “Probably, but I’m afraid Yuy would jump through the window screaming at me to stop touching you.”

            “He wouldn’t do that.  I think.”

            “He probably has your house bugged.  He’s probably listening to us right now.”

            “He’s probably still passed out,” I said.  I glanced at the clock.  It told me that it was 10:47.  “We have a couple of hours still.”

            “Then let’s commence with the hugging.”

            I suddenly found Trowa’s gangly frame wrapped around me.  Tro and I were more of the one armed hug kind of guys, but apparently a full-bodied hug was needed today.  We ended up with his arms wrapped around my waist and his head buried into my chest while I patted his back.

            “Sorry, Bloomsy,” I said.  “Do you want me to talk to him?”

            Trowa shook his head into my chest.

            I patted his back some more.  It was too damn quiet in here.

            “Seriously, though, someone should tell him…” I said.

            “Duo, shut up and turn on the TV or something.”

            “Oh,” I said.  “Okay.”

            I fumbled for the remote and watched a special on Animal Planet about sharks while I cuddled Trowa.

            Trowa just lay there quietly for almost an hour.  He doesn’t mind long periods of silence.  I think they’re horrid.  I really don’t know how we get along so well sometimes.

            “Okay,” he finally said, sitting up.

            “You’re… okay?” I asked.

            “Yes, I’ve decided to move on.”

            “Well, if you’ve decided it…”

            “I have.”

            “So you’re gonna stop picking up cute little blondies at bars?”

            “Go to hell, Maxwell.”

            “So that’s a no.”

            Trowa was not impressed with my wit, and gave me a very disparaging look.

            “Cigarette break?”

            Trowa nodded and followed me out to the balcony.

            We both pulled out our packs and lit up.

            “S’cold,” I commented.

            Trowa just shrugged.  He wasn’t even wearing a jacket.

            “So why did you tell Wufei and not me?” I finally asked.  It’d been gnawing at me.

            “Wufei’s a good listener,” Trowa said.

            “He is fucking not,” I protested.

            “He didn’t try to talk me out of it.”

            “I wouldn’t have tried to talk you out of it!”

            “No, but you would have said something like, ‘HOMG, Tro, that’s awesome dude, I like totally hope that works out for you bro.  Ya know how everything exploded with me an’ Heero my only love, but I’m sure that won’t happen to you two ’cause you’re just so much more mentally sane than me an’ Spandex Boy.  Besides that time when Quat went all Zero Systemy, but I’m sure he’s fine now and won’t try to kill you again-’”

            “I wouldn’t say ‘dude’,” I interrupted him.  But I really couldn’t fault him on a fairly accurate impression.  He even did crazy facial expressions and emoted slightly in his voice.

            “I’ve heard you say dude.”

            “When?”

            “Summer, AC 195.”

            “Hn.”

            “Well you would’ve been right.”

            “Huh?  Right about what?”

            “Two mentally damaged people can’t make a relationship work.”

            “You’re not… okay, well Quat’s not all that mentally damaged.”

            “I think I’m going to take Commander Une’s job offer.”

            “Wait, stop changing the subject…”

            “Try and keep up.”

            “Who the hell can keep up with schizophrenia?”

            “If I take over the colony training for the new recruits, you don’t have to keep coming to space.”

            “I like coming to space…”

            “Wufei gets lonely without you.”

            “That’s a blatant lie.”

            “Heero gets lonely without you.”

            “He just doesn’t have someone to order around to do his bidding.”

            “Then maybe you should come with me to space permanently.”

            “Wait, what?”

            “You and I can cover all the space training.”

            “Trowa, you’re hurting my brain.  Slow down.”

            “Just thinking out loud.”

            I sighed and lit another cigarette.  “Can I join the circus?”

            “No,” Trowa said.

            “Why the hell not?”  
            “You’re not good at circus work.”

            “The hell I’m not.”

            “Fine, I don’t want you sniffing around my cute little blondies at the bar,” Trowa said like it was a confession.  “Cute little blondies dig shorties with braids.”

            “Did you just make a Quatre-related self-mocking joke?”

            “Yes,” Trowa said.  “See, I’m already healing.  It’s like I’m completely over him.”

            “Is that what I sound like?” I asked.

            “I think I actually just quoted you verbatim.”

            “Ugh, it’s like looking in a freakishly tall, cyclops mirror.”

            “Boys suck.”

            “Totally.  You and me should get together.”

            “Oh, this should be good.”

            “I’m serious.  We’d be an awesome couple.  We’d just never have sex.  But I’d totally pick up some cute little blondies at the bar with the power of my braid and bring them home for you.”

            “Duo… please see a therapist.”

            “Why?  Are you opposed to your boyfriend bringing sexy blonds home for you to ravish?”

            “No, I think that’s pretty great.  It would make you the best boyfriend ever.  Except for the whole refusing to have sex with me thing.  That’s pretty much unawesome.”

            “That’s not even a word.”

            “Your neuroses breathed the word into life.”

            “What the actual fuck.”

            “Duo, your rabid fear of sex is not normal.  I think you’d like sex very much if you actually had it.”

            “Are you trying to seduce me?”

            “You’re not blond.”

            “I could dye my hair.”

            “Are you trying to seduce _me_?”

            “Maybe.”

            “I don’t want a guy who doesn’t put out.”

            “What the hell’s wrong with not putting out?  Maybe some people were just not meant to put out!”

            “Yes, but you clearly want to put out.”

            “I thought I had a… how did you put it… a rabid fear of sex?”

            “Yes, exactly,” Trowa said.  “You’re afraid, but you want it bad.”

            “You sound like Quatre,” I said, then immediately covered my mouth.

            “You can say his name.”

            “Yeah, but…”

            “Let’s go inside,” Trowa said, putting out his cigarette in the ashtray.  “You’re turning blue.”

            I took a couple more drags before heading back in.

            Trowa and I decided it was a good afternoon for drinking.

            We went to a divey little place where we weren’t even the only lunchtime alcoholics.

            To be fair, Trowa and I had gotten a lot better about the drinking since we quit doing field work for the Preventers.  Today was just a special occasion.

            “You’re outta practice, Maxy,” Trowa slurred at me after we’d put down a few drinks and I could barely sit up, laying my cheek against the table.

            “Fuck you and your horse,” I answered.  Who knows what I was talking about, I sure didn’t.

            We were soon gently recommended to leave the bar.  Fortunately it was within walking distance of my apartment.  Unfortunately we were both drunk as shit, so I had to call Wufei to come find us.

            “Where are you?”

            “Near the… fire hydrant,” I supplied.

            “And the stop light!” Trowa input.

            “Morons,” Wufei spat out and hung up.

            “Is he coming?” Trowa asked.

            “Probably,” I said.

            We decided to sit on the sidewalk and wait since standing was hard.

            “What the fuck is wrong with you two?” Wufei raged after screeching the car to a stop in front of us.  “It’s three o’clock and you’re completely shitfaced.”

            “He swears more since you shacked up together,” Trowa told me.

            I nodded.  “I have that effect on people.”

            “We’re not shacked up!”

            Trowa was able to get into the car by his own power and almost even buckled his seatbelt.  Wufei had to carry me, because by then I wasn’t feeling very well.

            “You really are out of practice,” Trowa said with a snort.

            I tried to glare but I was working myself up to a good hurl.

            “Better drive slowly and avoid bumps,” Trowa advised Wufei.

            “You puke in my car and I shall acquaint you with the pointy end of my sword.”

            Trowa dissolved into a fit of giggles.

            “Why do you laugh at death threats, Barton?!” Wufei demanded.

            “P-p-penis!” Trowa sputtered out, still laughing.

            I was laughing too, which was really not helping my stomach.

            Good thing it was only a three minute drive.

            I puked as soon as I got out of the car.

            Binge drinking is always a poor idea in hindsight, but an excellent one beforehand.

            Heero didn’t used to be able to get more than a bit of a buzz when he first started drinking, so I would drink copious amounts of alcohol to keep him company.

            We were such horrible influences on each other, kind of like me and Tro when we first started working for the Preventers.

            Before we left he cabin, though, I think we were actually pretty good influences on each other.  I had somehow managed to do the impossible and reconnect Heero to the outside world.  For his part, he got me to phone in my resignation as a Preventers field agent.  I thought I needed the work, but Heero gently led me to the conclusion that training agents and training agents only would be fulfilling enough.  And better for my psyche.

            Heero had already decided that he couldn’t take lives anymore.  He helped me realize that I couldn’t either.

            We were in a good place our last night in the cabin.

            I made us a fancy dinner in our barebones kitchen.  Heero was suitably impressed with my below average cooking skills.  We shared a couple of bottles of wine that I bought in town for the occasion, which resulted in me getting a little tipsy and Heero just looking amused.

            “What now?” I asked, spinning the empty wine bottle around on the table.

            “I’ll wash, you dry?” Heero suggested.

            I shrugged, getting up and helping him clear the table.  We washed the dishes in silence, but it wasn’t uncomfortable.

            I was drying the last cup when Heero caught me in a hug from behind.

            “What’s up?” I asked, leaning my head back so I could look at him.

            “Do we have to go tomorrow?” he asked, giving me sad eyes.

            “Yes,” I said, turning back around so I could put the cup in the drainer and hang up the towel.

            “I don’t want to lose you,” he said softly, resting his chin on my shoulder.

            “We’ll figure something out,” I said, threading my fingers with his.

            We stood there for a while, then Heero suddenly tugged me off to the living room.  We sat on the couch, and Heero started undoing the tie at the end of my braid.

            “Hey!” I protested, pulling my braid to my chest protectively.

            “Please?” he said, giving me those goddamn puppy dog eyes of his.

            “What the hell for?”

            “Because tonight’s special.”

            I chewed on my lip, and in my moment of indecision Heero was suddenly working his fingers through my braid, undoing it.

            I was red.  But what else was new?

            “Sorry,” he said softly, running his fingers through my loose hair.

            Heero never apologized.

            “Good,” I muttered.

            “It’s just this might be my last chance, so…”

            “Heero, we’re going to be together at Relena’s for the next couple of days.”

            “Yeah, but…” he trailed off with a sigh.  “Sorry.”

            Then he was suddenly peeling off his shirt.

            “Hey, wait, what?!”

            The pants went next.

            I was staring at Heero Yuy in nothing but socks and his teeny tiny boxer briefs.  And boy was I staring.

            I suddenly found my hand being pressed to his arm.

            “From the first time we met,” he said.

            “Huh?”

            Heero pressed my finger more firmly into his skin and I could feel the hard, puckered flesh.

            “When I shot you?” I breathed out softly.

            “And this one to match,” he said, taking my hand and moving his to his thigh.

            I felt the scar and shivered.

            He guided my hand up past his hips.  “The Eve Wars,” he said.

            And slowly he guided my hand over endless scars, explaining each and every one of them.  The self-detonation scars made my blood run cold.  They were over very vital areas.  How close he came to death was carved into his body in shiny white lines.  I started tracing the scars on my own, softly asking their story as I explored every inch of Heero’s body.  He had scars from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet.  The fact that his face was mostly unmarred was some kind of miracle, with only a thin scar running down his right temple.  Shrapnel wound.

            I found myself pressing my lips to it, kissing my way down his face.

            “Duo,” Heero gasped out, voice low and needy.

            I suddenly realized that I was sitting in his lap and that my hair was fucking everywhere.

            Heero ran a hand through the roots of my hair, and it felt _good_.

            We stared at each other from inches apart, breath coming out in matching, shallow rhythms.

            “No kissing in the cabin,” I whispered, feeling nervous and wanting some kind of escape from the overwhelming intimacy of the moment.

            Heero did not look very pleased about that, but nodded.  Then he shoved my shirt up to my chin.

            “Hey!” I protested.

            His calloused fingers traced roughly over the scarred flesh on my ribcage.

            “When?” he asked.

            “When OZ took me prisoner,” I said, my breath catching in the back of my throat as he traced the scars over and over.  “Beat the shit out of me.”

            “I remember,” Heero said, resting his palm over my heart.  “I almost killed you.”

            “But you didn’t,” I said, staring down at his hand and feeling my heart speed up under it.

            “No,” he said, hand sliding up to the scar on my collarbone.

            “Let an Ozzie get a little too close…” I trailed off, feeling all fluttery and shivery.

            Heero tugged my shirt up and I found myself raising my arms to oblige the removal of it.  Then he was gathering my hair over my shoulder and shifting us around so he could look at my back.

            “Sanc?” he asked, tracing the faded shrapnel scars.

            “Yeah,” I said, running my fingers through my hair anxiously.  It was all snarly and frizzy and my god did Heero’s hands feel good.

            “This burn scar, too?”

            “Yeah,” I said.

            “Knife wound?” he asked, tracing along my lower back.

            “Literally got stabbed in the back,” I said, trying to make it a joke but finding it hard to concentrate.

            “The war?”

            “The streets.”

            “Looks pretty deep.”

            “Street kids take their territory pretty seriously.”

            “You don’t have as many scars as me,” Heero mused quietly, calloused fingers tracing along the top of my jeans.

            “I haven’t done as many stupidly suicidal things as you,” I said, leaning back against Heero and pressing my cheek to his.

            “You’ve done your share,” he said, hands sliding along the top of my jeans until they met at the front.  The light brush of his fingers along my skin had my eyes sliding shut.

            The sound of a zipper being undone had them sliding back open.

            “Hey…” I said, looking down at my open pants.

            “Show me the rest,” Heero murmured into my hair.

            “The rest of _what_?” I squeaked.

            “The rest of your scars,” he said, sounding amused.

            Smug bastard.

            “Oh,” I said.  I surprised myself by pressing my feet to the ground and leveraging myself off the couch.  My pants were tugged down to my ankles, and I sat back down and kicked them off.  Did Heero hypnotize me or something?  Where did my pants go?  And why was I suddenly sprawled on my back with Heero crouched between my legs?

            “What’s this from?” Heero asked, tracing the short line of discolored skin next to my knee.

            “Uh…” I said.  I was feeling a bit disoriented.

            Heero touched it more firmly.  “Well?”

            I swallowed.  “I uh… I was blowing up an Alliance military base and I almost got caught up in the blast so I was running like hell to get out of there.  Didn’t notice it happen, but when I finally got to my gundam I realized my leg was bleeding like crazy.”

            Heero nodded, hands sliding down to my calf.  There were lots of little scrapes and burn scars, most of which I couldn’t even clearly say where they came from.

            “You get burned a lot,” Heero mused, fingers lingering over the acid burn on the top of my right thigh. 

            “I like to play with explosives,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady.  “Jerk,” I added for good measure.

            Heero gave me a look, clearly expressing his confusion over the tacked-on statement.  Well, it was clear to me.  To others it probably just looked like a minimal movement of his mouth.

            “How can you just touch me like that?!” I sputtered out, feeling like I was on my last nerve.

            “What do you mean?” he asked, not moving his hands.

            “You are touching very intimate places like it ain’t no thang.”

            Heero mouthed the last three words to himself, looking even more confused.  “You don’t like it?”

            “Obviously I like it,” I growled at him.  The evidence of my like was pretty much standing up right in front of his face.

            “Then what’s the problem?” Heero asked.  He slid his hand up the inside of my thigh and stared at me pointedly.

            I could not be more embarrassed.  Or erect.

            Then Heero smiled a cute, happy smile, and I melted into a puddle of stupid Duo goo.

            “You make me so happy,” he said.

            I was done.  Stick a fork in me.

            Wait, that was definitely not the metaphor I wanted…

            “I want to make you happy, too,” Heero said.  “I just don’t know how.”  He was so damn sincere with his puppy dog eyes.

            I touched his cheek.  “Come home with me?”

            I swear to god he was about to cry.  I suddenly found myself with an armful of Heero as he buried his face in my chest, mumbling something.

            “What?” I asked gently, patting his head.

            “I don’t think I can,” he finally mumbled loud enough for me to hear.

            Well, that hurt.  I sighed.  “It’s okay.”

            “Why am I so fucked up?”

            “We’re all fucked up,” I said, continuing to pat his head.  At least I didn’t have an erection anymore…

            Heero peeked up at me, his long chocolate bangs almost completely obscuring his eyes.  “I don’t even think I can go to Relena’s…”

            “Of course you can go to Relena’s,” I said.

            “I can’t,” he said, his lower lip sticking out in a pout.

            I think I almost died from the adorableness.

            “Why are you making that face?” he asked suspiciously.

            “I’m not making any face,” I said, looking away from him quickly.

            Heero suddenly grasped my face with both hands and we were staring into each others’ eyes from far too close.

            “Duo,” he finally said, lips centimeters from mine.

            “Yes?” I panted back.

            “Let’s go to bed.”

            It sounded really sexy the way he said it.

            I found myself being tugged into the bedroom and pushed over to the bed while Heero lit the fireplace.

            “S’cold,” I commented, looking down at my mostly naked body and my extremely perky nipples.

            Heero turned and gave me a look that I dare call smoldering.

            “I’m gonna uh go get some clothes,” I said, inching towards the door.

            Heero stopped me in my tracks with a look.

            “No clothes allowed?” I whimpered.

            Heero nodded gravely.

            I inched back towards the bed and climbed under the sheets.  Which were also cold.

            Then Heero was in bed with me and things got a lot warmer.  We ended up spooning with a lot of wandering hands.  My embarrassment kept me nice and warm.

            We didn’t even break the no kissing rule, though I was pretty sure the original wording was more along the lines of ‘we’re not a couple in the cabin, we’re just friends.’

            I think we’d gotten past the point where Heero needed that kind of limit.  He’d accepted his feelings for me, whatever they were.  When it came to us being together, he didn’t seem hesitant anymore.  In fact, he seemed pretty damn confident, most of the time anyway.

            I was the one who was scared.


	9. Chapter 9

            I woke up my last morning in the cabin feeling warm and nice.  Heero was pressed against my back, a muscular arm curled around my stomach.  His warm breath fluttered the hair on the back of my neck at every exhale.  His skin was warm against mi- ho shit we were like naked.  And my hair was fucking everywhere.  And Heero had _morning wood_.

            Heero woke up as soon as my body tensed, suddenly alert.

            One interesting thing about two trigger-happy soldiers sharing a room is how the slightest change in the other during sleep sends one of us ready to spring into action.  When Heero and I first started sharing the bedroom, every time I got up to pee I found myself at the wrong end of Heero’s gun.  But on the other side, sometimes when Heero had nightmares, I’d wake up going for a knife.

            Good thing we didn’t sleep with our weapons anymore.  And I only almost stabbed Heero the once.  He has good reflexes.

            “What’s wrong?” Heero asked, using his flat mission voice.

            “N-nothing…” I said.  I’m sure I sounded very convincing.

            Heero’s arm tightened around me and he nuzzled the back of my neck.  He seemed to have assessed that there was no threat to our imminent safety and relaxed.

            “We have to get up,” I said, eyeing the battery-operated clock on the wall.

            “Soon,” Heero agreed, and his hold got even tighter.

            “You okay?” I asked.

            He didn’t answer.

            So we lay together in the quiet for a while.  Heero was probably running mission parameters, plotting the best course to the airport even thought he’d already checked our course about 500 times.  Then he’d think about going through security, and where our nearest exits were, and other banal things that I had given my own fair amount of thought to as well, but was trying to stop and just act normal.

            It had gotten harder after living in the middle of the woods.  I found myself slipping back to a lot of old nervous habits.  Like feeling stressed about going to an airport.

            Airports are good targets.

            “Heero,” I said.  He didn’t need to be thinking about stupid things anymore.

            “Duo?”

            “It’s time to get up.”

            Heero let out a very long and loud sigh.

            I snorted.

            “What?”

            “You’re cute,” I said.

            “I am?” he asked, sounding confused.

            “Mm,” I said, squirming around so I could face him.  Some of my hair was trapped under him and tugged painfully as I moved.

            Heero noticed, and shifted around to help free all my monstrous mass from under him.

            “The braid’s a lot easier, I guess,” Heero conceded, fingers lingering through my hair.

            “Yes, Heero, that would be the understatement of the year.”

            “But I like it,” he said, rubbing it between his fingers and looking for all the world like a little boy with a new toy.

            “Good, then you can brush out all the tangles,” I said, making a face at him.

            “Really?” he asked, eyes lighting up even more.

            “What the hell, Heero,” I said.  “It takes forever and it’s annoying.”

            Heero still looked very excited at the prospect.

            “I’m not a doll,” I said, eyes narrowing.

            “Of course not,” he said, getting up and giving his very lovely and scantily-clad body a stretch.  He poked around in the fireplace and got a new fire going, then went over to my hair care table and picked up my brush.

            “Did Dr. J know you were into this kind of thing?” I asked, watching as he approached with the brush.  “It was probably a dead giveaway for your homo tendencies.”

            “I did not have sexual desires during the war.”

            I gave Heero the funny look that statement deserved.  God, he was such a weirdo.  I sat up and smoothed my hair out.  It was all knotted and snarled to hell.

            “It’s cold,” I complained, pulling the blanket up to my shoulders and wrapping it around me with my hair hanging over it.

            Heero shrugged and started working at a tangle with the brush.

            I winced as the brush tugged at my scalp.  “Gentle, Heero.  Pretend I’m Wing or something.”

            Heero snorted, but seemed to figure out how not to yank my hair out of scalp with my very adept analogy.

            I closed my eyes and relaxed.  No one had brushed my hair in over ten years, and it was just as soothing as it had been back then.

            “This is okay?” Heero finally asked, continuing to work the brush through my hair.

            “Mm,” I said.  Despite all my hair issues, it was actually very okay.

            “Are you going to wash it?”

            I cracked an eye open and glance at the clock.  “Don’t really have time,” I said.

            “Then do you want me to braid it?” he asked, sounding all anxious and cute.

            “Do you know how…?”

            “I’ve seen you do it enough.”

            “Okay,” I said.

            Heero looked pleased.  He gave my hair a final pass with the brush, then divided it into three parts.

            He didn’t do too badly.  It was a little loose, but functional.

            “Thanks, Heero,” I said, dropping the braid behind my back.

            Heero just nodded, red dotting his cheeks.

            Goddamn, he was the cutest thing in the world.

            I blushed, too, and then we headed in separate directions to get ready for our drive to the airport.

            I got dressed, then packed up the rest of my things and stuffed them into my duffle bag.  My bike was already loaded onto the back of Heero’s truck, so I was ready to go.

            Heero was getting the cabin ready for his absence, making sure everything was locked and secured.  His suitcase was already packed and waiting by the door.

            I was drinking coffee and eating pancakes when Heero came to sit with me at the table.  I presented him with some tea and pancakes, and he started to eat silently.

            I looked at him, sitting in the cold ass cabin in his usual seat across from me, and I couldn’t help but think how much I would miss this.

            Things were definitely not going to be the same from this point on.

            I loaded our bags into the car and Heero locked the front door.

            “This is it,” I said.

            Heero just grunted.  He had his mission face on.

            “Okaaaay, let’s go then,” I said.

            Heero moved purposefully towards the car.  We got in, Heero turned the engine over, and we pulled away.

            I spared the cabin a last, lingering glance, then turned my eyes forward, focusing on the road ahead of us.

            Heero was tense as hell the further away from the cabin we got.  I put on the radio and was immediately yelled at.  I started singing to myself and was once again yelled at.

            “Am I supposed to just sit here silently for the next four hours?!” I demanded.

            “Yes.”

            “Like hell I’m gonna do that.”

            “Then get out.”

            “Oh, you’d like that, wouldn’t you?  Then you could just turn around and go hide in your stupid cabin.”

            “At least I wouldn’t have to hear you loud mouth.”

            “Fuck you, asshole.”

            “Idiot.”

            “Bastard.”

            “Moron.”

            “Why the hell does every insult you use on me mean stupid?”

            “I think the reason is obvious,” Heero said.

            “You think I’m stupid?!”

            Heero just shrugged.

            I was infuriated.  I crossed my arms over my chest and let out a huff.  I tapped my foot angrily on the ground.  I exuded _pissed off_.

            Heero ignored me and continued driving.

            This is what our interactions during the war had always been like.  It was kind of nostalgic in a way, but I was too irritated to care.

            Of course, Heero never apologized back then.  He still didn’t now, but he suddenly reached over and turned on the radio.

            Our eyes met briefly before he turned back to face the road.

            “Asshole,” I said.

            Heero just shrugged.

            I poked him in the arm, then left him to his thoughts and hummed along to the radio.  I ended up falling asleep and waking up at the airport.  We dropped my bike off at the delivery service first, so that it would head straight back to my apartment.  Heero went to park the car while I waited with our bags.

            Being in such a crowded place clearly made Heero nervous.  His eyes kept darting around, checking all the exits.  I guided him along through check-in and security, then got us seated in a corner by the wall so Heero could happily keep watch while feeling like his back was safe.

            Then we had to actually get on the plane.  I wished that tranquilizers worked on Heero, but unfortunately you needed a dinosaur-sized dosage to get him to go out, and carrying any drug in that large of a quantity was illegal.

            I tried to get him to watch a movie and I kept giving the girl next to me apologetic looks.  I was immune to Heero’s glaring, but it seemed to terrify her.

            I got Heero a nice warm tea, forced him to watch an animated movie with dancing and singing animals, and decided not to care about the fact that we were in public and rubbed his shoulders while he watched.

            The intensity of Heero’s glare decreased slightly.

            I understood that Heero didn’t feel in control of the situation.  He felt vulnerable and anxious.  But I just wanted to slap him in the head and tell him to snap out of it.

            So I did.

            I got a glare for my trouble.  A super threatening one that made the girl next to me suddenly get up and rush off to the bathroom.

            “The pilot is perfectly capable of piloting this plane, and no one is trying to kill you,” I said, glaring back.

            “You don’t know that.”

            “Shut up and watch your dancing animals.”

            “I don’t want to.”

            “You watch those goddamn animals or I’ll be the one to kill you.”

            “Like you could,” Heero said, giving me a very sullen look.

            “Try me.”

            Heero went for the gun that wasn’t there.

            I raised an eyebrow at him.

            Heero actually looked kind of embarrassed.

            I sighed and pushed up the armrest between us, settling my arms around his shoulders.  It wasn’t the most comfortable position for me, but whatever.  I pressed my cheek to his and reached around to unpause the movie.  I made sure his headphones were settled nicely on his ears, hit the call button for the flight attendant and ordered him some sake.

            I held Heero and fed him copious amounts of alcohol.  The flight attendant didn’t seem opposed to giving Heero over the legal serving limit, as long as he was quiet and not glaring at her.

            The girl never came back from the bathroom, though.

            Our flight was actually to Sweden, and from there we boarded a smaller plane headed for Sanc.

            Heero had a slight buzz going, which I nursed in between flights.  The second flight was very short and much more pleasant.  Heero was significantly less surly and mostly just leaned into my arms while I stroked his hair.

            I was very happy when our captain announced that we were landing in Sanc.

            The queen herself came to greet us, and was quite happy to have her exuberant hug returned from Heero.

            ‘Is he drunk?’ she mouthed to me over his shoulder.

            ‘You’re welcome,’ I mouthed back.

            Relena and I did not hug.  We just kind of nodded at each other and then got into the car.

            Heero attached himself to my arm, leaning into me heavily.

            “How was your flight?” Relena asked pleasantly.

            I shook my head vigorously, trying to get a change of topic.

            “It was okay,” Heero said, and I stared at him like he had five heads.  “I watched a nice movie and had a couple drinks.”

            “That’s good,” Relena said, smiling warmly.  She’d pretty much been glowing since she first set eyes on Heero.  She didn’t even seem bothered by the fact that he was wrapped up around me.

            That ended up being a continuing theme for the weekend.  Heero did not leave my side.  He was always touching me and I could barely break away to take a piss.  I had to pass him off to Relena just to take a shower, and even then he still tried to follow after me.

            The other guests were arriving the next day.  Relena had kept it limited to just the other gundam pilots, her brother, and her sister-in-law.  Relena was being very careful and thoughtful of Heero, and I don’t think it would have worked out any other way.

            Heero’s antisocial tendencies had seemed to develop into some kind of full-blown mental condition during his time spent in isolation.  He just couldn’t relax when he was put into social situations.  The only thing that seemed to calm him was keeping him drunk and close to me.

            Wufei and Quatre arrived together the next morning.

            I broke away from Heero and almost tackled Wufei to the ground.  He definitely would have gone down if he hadn’t been expecting it.

            “Fei-Fei!” I crooned, smothering him with my hugs.  I missed the uptight jerk, okay?

            “Yuy, get your mongrel off me!” Wufei snarled, trying to resist my love and affection.  But secretly he was loving it because he missed me, too.  I knew this because I hadn’t been physically maimed for my impudence.

           I could feel Heero’s glare on the back of my neck, so I finally let go of Wufei and gave his black hair a ruffle, which got me a matching glare from Wufei.  I turned and gave Quatre a nice, normal hug, which was reciprocated in kind.

            As soon as I let go, I had my leech attached back to my arm, hanging behind me with a shy glare.

            “Heero, it’s great to see you,” Quatre said.  Then he actually went in for the hug, surprising Heero.  It was a passive hug back, but it was still a hug.

            “Yuy,” Wufei said, holding his hand to him.

            Heero glared at his hand.

            “You’re supposed to shake it,” I told him.

            “I know that,” Heero said, turning his glare on me before reaching out and giving Wufei a very firm handshake.  Maybe a little too firm, but Wufei didn’t react.

            I thought that since they’d all been in contact things wouldn’t be awkward, but they were in fact hella awkward.  It was much easier for Heero to interact with people through technology than it was in person.

            So I let Heero continue his parasite act, and sat with him through an extremely boring talk with Relena about politics, and an even more boring talk about the weather with Noin and Zechs.  Heero held my hand all day, making both our palm sweaty and gross, but still he wouldn’t let go.  I stopped being embarrassed about it after the first hour.

            Trowa was the last to arrive, and he and Heero exchanged mutual grunts and did their eye communication thing that both drove me crazy and entertained me terribly.

            Relena had prepared a grand feast for us, and I was sure to eat everything on the table and drink as much of her majesty’s wine as I could cram down my throat, making sure to siphon off as much as possible to Heero, as well.

            Things got a lot more pleasant after Heero was drunk.  He even stopped glaring and smiled a bit.  I heard him laugh once after he and Trowa had a long eye exchange.

            The party broke up around midnight, and Trowa helped me lead Heero up the stairs.

            “I’ve never seen him this drunk before…” I commented as we sat him on his bed.

            “He looks like you three years ago,” Trowa commented.  “Good night, Heero.”

            “Mm, night Tro,” Heero said.

            “I’ll leave him to you,” Trowa said with a suggestive wiggle of his eyebrow.

            I glared at him.  “Good night, Trowa.”

            “Good night, Duo,” he said, making it somehow sound suggestive.

            “Stupid cyclops,” I muttered.  “Come on, Heero, can you brush your teeth by yourself?”

            “Of course,” Heero said, stumbling off towards the bathroom.

            I opened up the bureau and got his pajamas out, setting them on the bed before following him into the bathroom.

            Aaaaand Heero was peeing.

            I couldn’t help but look.  I’m a curious guy.  I didn’t mean to, it just happened.

            So that was Heero’s penis.

            “Sorry!” I said, looking away.  I might have been a bit slow on the looking away part.

            “Why?” Heero asked over the steady sound of liquid splashing into the toilet bowl.

            “I uh… I dunno,” I said.

            Heero flushed and turned on the sink to wash his hands.

            I turned to look at him, but I just couldn’t look him in the eye.  “Toothbrush,” I said, holding it out to him.

            Heero took it and went to work brushing his teeth.

            When I finally looked at him, he had toothpaste dribbling down his chin.

            I grabbed a washcloth and cleaned his face with it.  Heero didn’t really react and continued messily brushing his teeth.  I dabbed up a few more dribbles, and then he tried to spit into the sink which didn’t go so well.  After I had him drool and toothpaste free, I pushed him back to his bed.

            “Can you dress yourself?”

            “Nope.”

            I paused.  “Are you lying?”

            Heero gave me a smile that was probably supposed to be seductive but just looked goofy and cute.  “Undress me?”

            “Undress your damn self,” I said, glaring at him through a heated blush.  I honestly could not stop thinking about his penis.

            “Fine,” Heero said, taking off his shirt and tossing it to the floor.  Then went the pants.  Then he started to take off his underwear.

            “Hey, whoa!” I said.  “What’re you doing there, buddy?”

            “Undressing.”

            “Yeah, you did it, you’re finished,” I said.  Now I really couldn’t stop thinking about his penis.

            “You sure?”

            “Yes!”

            Heero shrugged, letting go of the waist of his boxers with a snap.

            “Now put on your pjs,” I said.

            “Can’t.”

            “Can’t or won’t?”

            “Won’t.”

            “Do you have something against pajamas?” I asked.

            “Yes.”

            “Uh… and what would that be?’

            I’d slowed down the drinking after Heero had stopped being so scowly, but I was still a little tipsy myself.  So when Heero suddenly pinned me to the bed, I wasn’t really sure how it happened.

            “Huh?” I said.

            “We’re not in the cabin,” Heero said.

            “Well, no, that’s a good observation, we’re definitely not in the cabin,” I said.

            “Good,” Heero said, and then he was kissing me.

            He tasted like toothpaste and booze.

            I melted into him, feeling the movement of his tongue against mine.  It was slow and sensuous and hot and wet and omigod I was fondling Heero’s butt.

            I hadn’t meant to do that.  Probably.  But god it felt nice under my hands.

            Heero let out a very throaty growl which I felt rumble into my mouth.

            Then he pulled away, leaving me panting and needy.

            “Good night,” he said, flopping down onto his pillow.

            “Huh?” I said, but his breathing was already beginning to come out in loud, even breaths.

            He fell asleep.

            I shifted him around so I could get the blankets over him, but he barely reacted.  After I tucked him in, I headed out to my room.  I’d had yet to actually sleep in this room, since the night before Heero had been all clingy and pathetic, yet extremely scowly and angry when crossed, so I’d given in and spooned him to sleep.

            Tonight I would sleep alone.

            The room was really quiet, and it was weird not to hear Heero’s steady breathing coming from the floor.

            I felt a bit lonely and had trouble falling asleep.

            When I woke up the next morning, it was quite sunny and Heero was curled up around me.

            “Ugh.”

            Heero’s dark lashes fluttered open.  He looked at me blearily.  “Where… are we?”

            “Sanc,” I said.

            “Oh, right,” he said, relaxing slightly and nuzzling his cheek against my shoulder.  “Merry Christmas.”

            “Merry Christmas,” I echoed.

            “Duo?”

            “Mm?”

            “My head hurts.”

            “Ha,” I said.  “You have a hangover.”

            “If this is a hangover, I’m not very impressed,” Heero said.

            “You said your head hurts!”

            “It’s not so bad.”

            “You…”

            “Me what?”

            “I don’t know,” I said, suddenly wanting to hug him.

            Heero returned the hug.

            “How are you?” I asked.

            “I’m okay,” he said.

            “One more day.”

            “Yeah,” Heero said, arms tightening around me.

            We just hugged for a while.

            It was after eleven and everyone else had already gotten up and eaten breakfast.  Christmas lunch was planned to be served at twelve, so I ate a banana and decided to wait until lunch to eat properly.

            Heero went to talk to Relena, and I was proud of him that he wasn’t being so clingy.  Maybe he just needed me as a crutch to get through the first day, and now he would be fine.

            I was a very optimistic kind of person.

            I went to the game room and joined Quatre in watching Wufei and Trowa play darts.

            “So, did Heero make a man out of you last night?” Quatre asked conversationally.

            “What?!”

            Trowa was laughing so hard he threw a dart into the wall instead of the target.

            “Well he came into my room in the middle of the night, demanding to know where you were.”

            “What?!”

            “So I took him to your room.  He seemed very amorous.”

            “What?!”

            “Has anyone ever told you that you have a very limited vocabulary?” Quatre asked.

            I glared at him and restrained myself from saying ‘what’ again.

            “Winner,” Wufei said.  “Lay off.”

            I stared at him adoringly.  “Wufei!”

            “Obviously nothing happened,” Wufei said, squinting at the target as he aimed his dart.

            “Why obviously?” I asked.

            Wufei took his shot, landing in the green ring circling the bull’s-eye.  “Because you do not look like a man deflowered.”

            I was red.  I was embarrassed.  I didn’t have a good comeback.  “I have many flowers!” I snapped, sending the room into hysterics.  I don’t even know what I meant to say.

            Wufei looked especially pleased, the bastard.

            I felt like my face was about to explode.  I was definitely one of those people who could dish it but couldn’t take it.  Well, no, I could take a joke.  But this wasn’t a joke.  This was about Heero and me and sex and omigod Heero’s penis.  No, I had to stop thinking about that.  I was never going to picture that lovely, thick… wait.  No.   No more.  Be gone from my memory.

            It didn’t work.

            Quatre calmed down first and gave me a very apologetic look.  “I’m sorry, Duo, really.  I’m happy for you two.  It’s one thing to talk to Heero about his feelings for you from halfway around the world, and it’s quite another to see it in person.”

            “He talks about me?”

            “You’re his only topic of conversation, outside of ‘it’s cold’ and ‘I killed a bear with my bare hands today’,” Trowa commented.

            “He was lying, he used a pocket knife,” I said.

            “Yuy killed a bear with a pocket knife?” Wufei asked, shaking his head.

            “Yeah, we had to eat bear meat for weeks,” I said, wrinkling my nose.

            “Stop trying to change the subject,” Quatre said, poking me in the side.  “Heero talks about you all the time.  He’s very smitten and it’s adorable.”  Quatre was one of the few people in the world who agreed with me and Relena that Heero was adorable.

            I stared down at my pointer fingers, pressing them together.  This was awfully embarrassing.

            “If it makes you feel better, Yuy never talks about you to me except to commiserate about what a terrible roommate you make,” Wufei put in.

            “Good,” I said.  “No, wait.  What the hell.  I am the most awesome roommate ever.”

            “You leave your shit everywhere and you never do chores unless you are asked repeatedly to do them.  And you never stop complaining.”

            “Shut up,” I said.  I was really out of comebacks today.

            Trowa and Wufei finished their game while Quatre kept trying to tell me how cute Heero and I were together, and how we should start making lots of nephews and nieces for him.  I tried to explain the birds and the bees to him, which got me a very sassy reply about how he didn’t need a sex lecture from a virgin.

            “Well at least I know that a baby can’t come from two penises!” I snapped.

            That’s when Relena came in to invite us to lunch.

            Quatre giggled the whole way to the damn dining room.

            Heero was sitting in the same chair as last night, looking anxious.  His eyes locked onto mine and I quickly went over to sit next to him.

            “Hi,” he said, and his tone was very needy.

            “Hi,” I said, giving him my hand.

            His grip was a bit too strong, but it wasn’t like he was going to break my hand so I let him continue clinging to my hand as much as he wanted to.

            “You okay?” I asked.

            He gave me a look that clearly said, ‘No.’

            “What’s wrong?”

            “It’s just… a lot all at once,” he said quietly.

            “What, like a lot of people?”

            Heero nodded.

            “You’re with me all the time.  I’m a person.”

            “You’re you.”

            I squeezed his hand back as best I could in his bone crushing grip.  “Pretend they’re all me.”

            “That could be awkward.”

            The first course was being served and suddenly Relena was standing up to propose a toast.

            “To good friends getting together,” she said with that perfect smile of hers.  “Merry Christmas!”

            We all clinked glasses.

            Heero had the champagne downed before I’d even taken a sip.

            “Slow down there, drunky,” I said.

            “I like being drunk,” Heero said.  “But it’s very difficult to get drunk.”

            “Yeah, cause you have Super Liver 2.0,” I said.  “Hey Queenie, more booze.”

            Relena raised an eyebrow at me.

            “It’s for Heero,” I said.

            His glass was filled promptly.

            “Heero gets such great service,” I muttered.

            My glass was refilled, too.

            “Cheers,” I said, clinking my glass with Heero’s.

            “You two do know it’s only twelve o’clock, right?” Wufei muttered.

            “It’s Christmas, Wu,” I said.  “A day when dreams come true.”

            “And your dream is to drink from noon until night?”

            “Ah, but you know me so well.”

            Heero settled into eating and drinking quietly while I caught any conversational ball that came our way.  He relaxed a bit, but there was still tension around his eyes.

            I squeezed his hand sometimes and he gave me grimaces that were probably supposed to be smiles.

            After we had finished lunch and could barely walk from eating too much, we had a little gift exchange.  I’d picked up some little things in town from me and Heero.  Quatre and Relena overdid it like usual, and I really had no idea what I was supposed to do with a replica of Deathscythe made from crystal, but it was pretty cool anyway.

            Heero was now drunk enough to smile a little when he opened his gifts and even say thank you.  I was very pleased with his minding of his p’s and q’s, since he can be the rudest little shit sometimes.

            Everyone kind of went in separate directions for the afternoon.  Trowa and Quatre went for a walk along the grounds, Relena disappeared with her brother and Noin, and Wufei decided it was time for some meditation.

            Heero took my hand and dragged me off to his room.

            “What’s up?” I asked, as he sat me in the desk chair and stood over me, looking solemn.

            “We need to talk.”


	10. Chapter 10

            No one ever wants to hear what comes after, ‘we need to talk.’

            I took in Heero’s serious expression, despite his slight drunken swaying from side to side.  Was this it?  Were we going to talk about life After the Cabin?

            “Duo,” he said.

            There was a long pause.

            “Are we… boyfriends?”

            I blinked.

            “I uh… I mean I guess so…” I said.

            “You guess?” Heero asked, frowning.  “You don’t want to be?”

            “I just never really thought about it…” I said.

            Heero frowned even more.  “Well I’ve thought about it a lot.”

            “Oh…” I said.  “So uh… what did you decide?”

            “I decided,” he began, giving me an irritated look, “that I want to be boyfriends with you forever.  But apparently you don’t feel the same way.”

            “I think it’s more the word ‘boyfriends’ that I’m having trouble with,” I said, trying to not be overwhelmed by embarrassment.

            “So you don’t want to be my boyfriend,” he accused me, looking very angry and hurt all rolled into one.

            “I want to be with you,” I got in before he could continue.  “Like for always.  I love you.  Okay?  So if that means we’re boyfriends, then let’s be boyfriends.”

            Heero eyed my suspiciously.  “Really?”

            “Yes, really.”

            “I’m going back to the cabin tomorrow,” Heero said.

            “And I’m going back to Germany,” I said.

            “So what do we do?” Heero asked, his brows creasing in confusion.

            “I don’t know,” I said, taking his hands.  “We can video call and stuff.”

            Heero didn’t look very happy with that.

            “One of us eventually has to move,” I said.

            “You should just come back to the cabin with me.”

            “You should just come to my apartment with me.”

            We both looked at each other.  “I can’t,” we said simultaneously.

            Heero dropped down to the ground with a sigh, laying his head on my knee.

            I patted it gently, curling his brown hair around my finger.  “We’ll figure out something.”

            Heero got sad then, so I dragged him back downstairs and got him another drink.

            Heero struggled his way through the rest of the night.  He was tense, and the only people he seemed to not want to kill with his eyes were me and Relena.

            I took him to bed, didn’t argue when he dragged me down with him, and let him cling to me all night.

            Most people do not get Heero.  He comes off as very cold, rude, a dick, unnecessarily violent...  And while all these are accurate words to describe him, there’s a lot more to Heero.  You have to cut through the sharp outer shell to find the sweet boy inside.

            Yes, Heero is very sweet.  And a bit childish.  And very fragile.  His insides are basically the complete opposite of his outsides.  Relena saw it right away.  It took me a while, but I figured it out.

            So now I just want to protect that little boy in him and keep him safe.

            Heero’s flight was much later than me, Wufei, and Quatre’s, but he rode with us to the airport anyway.  We sat in the lounge together, not talking but with our shoulders just barely touching.

            When it was time to go through security, I stood up resolutely.

            Heero looked up at me, the only flicker of emotion in his eyes.

            “Well, be seein’ you,” I said.

            “Yeah,” Heero said.

            I turned around and headed towards the line where Wufei and Quatre were already waiting.

            And then we had a dramatic airport scene, with Heero suddenly grabbing my arm from behind, twisting me around, and kissing me like he meant it.

            “Duo,” he whispered against my mouth.

            And then he was gone, disappearing into the crowd.

            There was a small smattering of applause.

            I stood there dumbly for a while, then went to join Wufei and Quatre.  Wufei pretended that he didn’t know me, while Quatre was grinning ear-to-ear.  We went through security and headed towards home.

            It was like the last six months of my life were some kind of weird dream, and I had finally woken up.

            The first thing I did when I got home, though, was to call Heero.

            The bastard didn’t answer.

            So I arranged for my bike to be delivered.  I did some laundry.  I bickered with Wufei about nothing.  Then I called Heero again.

            “Duo, he’s not even home yet,” Wufei scolded me.

            “He has his cell phone…”

            “You can’t use cell phones on airplanes.”

            I glared at Wufei and his logic.

            “I don’t know what’s been going on with you and Yuy, but you’re here now.  He’s there.  You’re not in a symbiotic relationship, so try going without him for five minutes.”

            “Dick.”

            So I tried very hard.

            Heero called me when he got home.  I stared into the vid screen, wanting to crawl through it and give Heero a hug.  He looked miserable.

            “Everything okay?”

            “I was almost ejected from the airplane.”

            “Uh…”

            “They said I was frightening the passengers and crew.  I only bent that metal bar a little.”

            “Metal… bar…?”

            “And that flight attendant shouldn’t have touched me.”

            “Christ.”

            “Let’s not talk about it.”

            “Heero…”

            “I miss you.”

            “It hasn’t even been a day,” I said, smiling at him and his adorableness.

            “The cabin is different… without you.”

            “You’re cheesy.”

            “How am I cheesy?  I’m just stating a fact.”

            As I looked at him through the screen, I couldn’t help but wonder why I wasn’t there with him.

            It was easy to fall back into my old life, though.

            In the morning I would wake up and argue with Wufei while we made breakfast.  We’d drive to headquarters together, and Wufei would go up to the office while I’d head to the newly built training headquarters.

            Une had scored herself some huge funding from the government, and now the Preventers Europe branch had a full training facility.  All new Preventers were trained there, and I was the head trainer.

            I liked my new job.

            Noin came to supervise for the first couple of months, but after showing me the ropes, I was in charge.  I pulled in other current agents for specialized training, but the day-to-day regiment was all me.

            My first batch of recruits was only ten, all of them bigger and older than me, even the three girls, and they all had military experience.  I had to knock a couple of them on their asses a few times before I got their respect.

            We didn’t go advertising my gundam pilot status.  I fought in the war as a mercenary, and that’s all my recruits needed to know.  Une thought it was safer to keep our identities a secret, and I didn’t think she was wrong.  Of course my face had been splashed all over the TV before my scheduled execution, so sometimes people gave me squinty eyed looks like they might recognize me.  A guy in a bar had recognized me once.  His Ozzie wife had been killed in the fighting, and I made a convenient target for his grief.

            Wufei told me that I should just cut off the braid and people wouldn’t recognize me.

            Heero got mad when he heard about that and proceeded to yell at Wufei for about ten minutes through the video screen.

            Funny shit.

            I called Heero every night.

            I told him about my job and the recruits.  I told him what an asshole Wufei was, especially if Wufei was standing right next to me listening in.  I told him what I ate for breakfast.

            Heero mostly just listened.  Sometimes he’d tell me about what was happening in the woods, things only he and I cared about.  The mother fox was still coming around the cabin, and her babies were getting bigger and bigger.  The snow was starting to melt.  He’d caught a raccoon living under the porch.

            I wanted to go see Heero very badly.

            Everyone told me it was a bad idea, except for Quatre who thought that our true love should prevail over all.  I would have appreciated his support more without the ridiculous speeches.

            The goal was to make Heero leave the cabin and come to me.  Unfortunately, I was weak and needy.  Fortunately, my job kept me very busy.

            In May, Une decided to send me to space.  She wanted me to startup the space training curriculum.  Preventers’ new funding, coupled with some kind donations from the Winners, had resulted in the building of a new training center on L4.

            I was kind of excited to be piloting in space again.

            I went to tour the facility and get things ready for the first round of training in August.  While I was up there I went to see Hilde, who was still mildly irritated with me, but significantly less homicidal.  We had lunch, and I felt like maybe things could start going back to normal with us.  She seemed amused by the fact that I was dating Heero, and shook her head in a knowing way.

            I couldn’t call Heero very much while I was in space.  There’s not always a line to earth, and I was busy working.

            That bitch didn’t even answer the phone when I called him from back in my apartment.

            “Maybe he broke up with you and you didn’t notice,” Wufei said.

            I think I probably looked like I was going to cry.

            “Duo, I was joking…” Wufei said, looking at me uncertainly.

            “I… yeah…” I said, trying to smile.

            “Look, I don’t really understand it, but Yuy decided for some reason that he loves you, moron that you might be,” Wufei said.

            “Are you trying… to comfort me?” I asked.

            Wufei glared at me.

            “’Cause you seriously suck at it,” I said.

            “Poor Yuy,” Wufei muttered, stalking off to his room.

            Wufei and I have always had a testy relationship.  But it was the same with Heero, too.  We always fought.  I think I must be a masochist or something, though, because I kind of love fighting with the both of them.  Even though Wu was pissing me off, he still made me feel better.

            Ever since the Wufei and I were captured on the lunar base during the war and almost died of oxygen deprivation together, there’s been a weird kind of bond between us.  Wufei shows his concern by being bitchy.  I show my love by mocking him incessantly.

            It’s just how our relationship works.

            After my afternoon of binge drinking with Trowa, Wufei really let loose with his ranting.  He mostly let Trowa slide, while telling me how I was the stupidest, most childish, self-centered person in the world.  All throughout this rant he rubbed my back while I puked in the toilet, changed my clothes, put a wet washcloth on my forehead, and tucked me safely into bed.

            I told him he was an asshole and that he should go die in a fire.

            Trowa just laughed the whole time, then curled up next to me and went to sleep.

            It was early evening, so despite my alcohol poisoning I wasn’t tired.  My head hurt and my stomach was all churny, so I just cuddled with Trowa because he was big and warm.

            I thought about calling Quatre and yelling at him.  And emphasizing to him how gay he was.  I got up to do so once and Wufei shoved me back to bed.

            I was sad.

            Trowa deserved to be happy.  I pet his unibang, pushing it out of his eyes so I could look at his sleeping face.  His brows were slightly creased, like even in sleep he couldn’t relax.

            Wufei came in to check on us a few times.  I was awake every time, so he finally told me to come watch a stupid movie with him and eat something.

            “I never want to eat again,” I said, patting my empty stomach which churned at the thought of food.

            Wufei shook his head at me and went out to the living room.  I followed behind him and closed the door quietly behind me.

            “What stupid movie did you get?” I asked, eyeing the bag from the rental store.

            Wufei gestured for me to look myself while he shuffled into the kitchen.

            It was an old Chinese action movie.  Wufei loved to watch movies in Chinese.  I told him that no one spoke Chinese anymore, so why couldn’t we watch something more _American_.  He told me that I was an American cur, and that he would preserve his traditional language for posterity and the sake of culture.

            He presented me with some chicken broth, and we sat down on the couch together to watch the movie.  I took some slow, careful sips of the soup.  It felt funny going down, but my stomach growled its demands to be fed.

            The movie wasn’t so bad.  Bruce Lee was pretty badass.

            “I might go to space,” I said suddenly as the movie credits rolled.

            “The commander’s sending you for another training?”

            “No, I mean like permanently.”

            Wufei looked surprise.  And a bit… something.  I couldn’t name it, but it wasn’t a happy look.

            “I mean Trowa’s going to take over the space training, but the program keeps expanding, you know?  And McGill’s been covering for me when I go to space, so I think she could be ready to take over the European training branch…”

            “Where the hell did all this come from?” Wufei asked with a frown.

            “I don’t know, Trowa brought it up, and I’ve been kinda thinking about it…”

            “If that’s what you want to do,” Wufei said, but his tone seemed to say otherwise.

            “Wu…”

            “It’ll be much quieter and cleaner here if you go,” Wufei said.  “I’d be much happier.”

            “Liar,” I said, tucking him into a hug.

            “Why are you touching me?” he asked, but didn’t make any move to remove me.

            “Trowa said you’d be lonely without me,” I said, flashing him a cheeky grin.

            “Barton drank enough to drown a small village.”

            “You’d _misssssss_ me.”

            “Like I’d miss a brain tumor.”

            “I’m way sexier than a brain tumor.”

            “Yes, the way you were hurling your guts out in the toilet earlier was very sexy.”

            “I knew you thought I was sexy.”

            “Duo?”

            “Mm?”

            “It would be a lot quiet and cleaner here if you go.”

            “You already said that.”

            “I didn’t say if it was a good thing.”

            “You said you’d be happier.”

            “Did you memorize every word I said?”

            “Yes.”

            Wufei harrumphed and was cranky for a moment.  Then he said, “I… would miss telling you to shut up.”

            I snorted and hugged him more tightly.

            I didn’t want to leave the earth.  I didn’t want to leave the apartment and Wufei.  I didn’t want to leave Heero.  So maybe it was the booze and the horrible headache talking, but I suddenly felt like I needed to go to space.

            My first trip to space almost two years ago had gone well.  The new training facility was nice, and piloting a ship through space was something I ached to do.  I was excited to put my agent training plan into action.

            Then I got home and Heero didn’t answer his phone for two days, so I got depressed.

            “You’re like a child,” Wufei informed me as I moped around the apartment.

            The doorbell rang, and I dragged myself over to the door to open it.  It was probably Sally, coming to hound Wufei about something or other before the weekend was over, but I still looked through the peephole to double check.  You can never be too careful.

            I hurriedly unlocked the door and threw it open.  I stared.  It wasn’t a mirage.

            Heero Yuy was standing in front of my door.

            I stared at him with my mouth hanging open like an idiot.

            “Maxwell, you tell Po that I don’t want to hear it!” Wufei yelled from his room.

            Before I knew what was happening, Heero was kissing me and I was kissing him and then I was being lifted off the ground and carried to the couch.  I would have protested, but it was Heero after six months of No Heero, and all I could do was wrap my legs around his waist and kiss him desperately.

            We crashed into the couch and I found myself falling over the back and landing on the cushions with Heero on top of me.  Things got a little more heated from there.  There was a lot of grinding and groping and I started finding it difficult to concentrate on kissing when Heero was moving against me like _that_.

            Heero moved to kiss my neck, and all I could do was cling to him and pant.  He was licking and biting and sucking and _grinding_ and I came.

            Yes.  I am a very repressed little boy with no experience.  And apparently an early ejaculator.  Yet another thing to add to my wall of shame.

            Heero seemed happy as a goddamn clam.  He nuzzled my neck and kissed along my collarbone while I shuddered out my orgasm.  Then he gave me a chaste kiss on the lips.

            I was embarrassed as fuck.

            “Off,” I said quietly, pushing at his chest.

            “No,” Heero said, kissing up my jaw.

            “Heero…”

            “I missed you so much.”

            My pushing turned into clutching at his shirt.  I was having overwhelmingly conflicting feelings of wanting to run the fuck away and wanting to bury myself into him and never let him go.

            “I love you,” he said, kissing me over and over.

            Something occurred to me.

            “Shit!”

            “What?” Heero asked, moving to kiss my ear.

            “Wufei!” I said, shoving him off me.  He didn’t expect it, so I managed to escape.

            “He already left,” Heero said, sounding sour.  “He closed the door and brought in my bag, too.”

            I eyed the living room door which we hadn’t bothered to shut on our fumbling passionate mess of a way to the couch.  It was indeed shut and locked, with a duffle bag sitting beside it.

            “Oh,” I said.

            Heero was giving me puppy eyes, which was keeping me from bolting out the door.  My skin felt all crawly, though, like I was covered in bugs or something.  What had just happened had been a little much for me.

            “Aren’t you happy to see me?” he asked softly.

            I tried to focus on him.  “Of course I am!” I said.  Then I turned even redder, glancing down at the front of my pants.  My happiness had been quite apparent, or so I thought.

            “Should I go?”  His voice was quiet like a whisper.

            “No, no, no!” I cried, rushing over to him before I’d really thought about it and wrapping him in a fierce hug.  “Don’t go anywhere.”

            Heero returned the hug slowly.  I felt his arms shaking as they curled around me.

            “Heero?” I said gently, tucking my chin over the top of his head.  My final growth spurt had put me one inch ahead of Heero, and it pleased me more than anything.

            “I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said in a quiet, broken voice.

            We sank down to the floor together and I cradled him against me as he just started to talk, an endless flow of words about his confusion, his self-hatred, his fears.

            “I only feel right when I’m with you,” he concluded, and suddenly his full weight was against me, like he couldn’t hold himself up anymore.

            I patted his head and shifted us over to the wall so I could lean against it and hold Heero up against me.

            “Heero, I can’t make you right,” I said softly.  “I’m not even… right.  I’m a really fucked up person, you know.  But I’ll try and help you.  I’ll do anything for you, okay?”

            Heero just clung to me like a baby, body shaking from his cathartic release of emotions.

            “I love you,” I said, kissing the top of his head.  “We’re in this together, okay?”

            Heero nodded against my chest.

            I rocked him, humming softly as I did so, and slowly Heero calmed down.  I needed to calm myself down, too.  Heero had said some pretty intense things about basically wanting to die.  He said he didn’t see a reason for him to exist anymore because he’d outlived his purpose.  I’d just listened quietly at the time, but it made my heart ache to hear him talk like that.  It also worried the fuck out of me.

            “You want some tea?” I asked finally when it seemed like he was sleeping or something, he was so quiet and still.

            “Okay,” he said.

            I turned on the kettle and got him a mug from the cupboard.  I didn’t know shit about tea, but I knew Heero liked green tea so I fished some out from Wufei’s supplies.

            Heero sat at my kitchen table, looking lost.

            I wanted to help him, I just didn’t know how.


	11. Chapter 11

            Heero ended up moving in with me and Wufei.  I set him up on the couch, but he kept crawling into bed with me and I finally gave up and just moved him into my room.

            He was such a vulnerable, broken thing by this point, and I let him be.

            Since I had left the cabin, Heero had gotten more reclusive.  He didn’t venture into town, getting everything he needed from nature.  The only contact he had with human beings were phone calls with me and Relena, and emails and texts with the others.  I knew something was wrong, but to say that Heero was depressed just sounded strange.

            That’s exactly what he was, though.

            Every day was the same for him, with no sort of goal or ambition.  He was existing just to exist, and he was getting tired of it.  He was also carrying a lot of baggage on him, a lot of lives that were gone because of him.  His ghosts weighed him down and he sank deeper and deeper into his depression.

            “He needs his own life,” Quatre advised me over coffee.  “A job, a purpose.”

            “Une wants him for the Preventers,” I said.  “I told her no way was he being an agent.”

            “You don’t think it would be good for him?”

            “Heero said that he’d never kill again,” I said.  “Sometimes agents have to make hard choices.”

            Quatre nodded, blowing at his coffee before sipping it carefully.

            “She said he could work with me doing training, or he could do office work.”

            “Office work?” Quatre asked with a raised eyebrow.  “Like answering phones and filing documents?”

            I snorted at the image that created in my mind.  Heero Yuy, secretary.  It had a ring to it.  “No, as hilarious as that would be.  More like information gathering and uh you know creative computer investigations.”

            “Hacking?”

            “You didn’t hear it from me.”

            “That could be good for him,” Quatre said with a nod.  “He would mostly just be working with computers.”

            “Heero sure does love a computer,” I agreed.

            “Have you brought it up to Heero yet?”

            “I can’t even get him to leave the apartment, how the hell am I gonna get him to go to Preventers Headquarters?”

            “With sexy promises of naked fun?”

            “What the hell are you even saying.”

            Quatre just smirked at me.

            “Is that how you get Trowa to come and visit you so much?” I asked, glaring at him with my red face.

            Quatre sputtered at that, looking annoyed.

            “Ha,” I said.

            “Trowa and I aren’t like that,” Quatre shot back.

            “Bitch, please.”

            “In case you’ve forgotten, I have a girlfriend.”

            “Pft.”

            Quatre abruptly stopped speaking to me.

            I sighed, swirling the little stirry thing in my cup until I couldn’t take the quiet any longer.  “I’m sorry, Q,” I blurted out.

            Quatre gave me a very unpacified look.

            “I just think you two would make a hot couple,” I concluded.  “And then everyone would stop buggin’ me ’n Heero all the time and bug you two instead.”

            “What is anyone even bugging you two about?” Quatre asked, clearly trying to move the subject away from him and Trowa.  They were so obviously into each other, and I didn’t really get why Quatre was so resistant about it.

            “I dunno, I think Relena’s planning our wedding or something,” I said, rolling my eyes.  “She keeps asking me weird questions, like what kind of flowers I like or similar dumb shit.  Christ, she asked me about rings the other day.”

            “What about rings…?”

            “Do I prefer silver or gold?  Simple bands or something more detailed?”

            Quatre snorted, the amusement returning to his blue eyes.  “Are you sure she’s asking on behalf of Heero?”

            “Who else would she be asking for?  Dorothy?” I asked, giving myself the shivers.

            “Maybe she’s asking on her own behalf,” Quatre said, beaming at me.

            “Just stop,” I said.  “No.”

            Quatre continued to rib me about my approaching wedding to Relena, and I gave him annoyed looks, and it seemed like all was forgiven in the Trowa department.

            I went home and tried to work up the nerve to tell Heero to quit being a depressed leech and get a damn job.

            It wasn’t that I was afraid of Heero or anything.  His temper mostly just amused me.  I had to work up my nerve because the boy had gotten so damn pathetic.  I felt like I was kicking a puppy when I got out of the bed in the morning.

            “Not yet,” he’d whisper, tugging at the back of my pajama shirt.

            “I have to get ready for work Heero.”

            Then he’d give me goddamn puppy eyes and I’d find myself climbing back into bed with him, holding him close and stroking his hair and being late for work _again_.

            Heero was very different now.  He wasn’t War Heero.  He wasn’t Marimeia Heero.  He definitely wasn’t Cabin Heero.  He was Very Pathetically Sad and Clingy Heero.  He was You Will Have to Kill Me Before I Leave This Apartment Heero.

            It was depressing.

            “Heero, do you want to go to the movies?”

            “No.”

            “Quatre invited us to his place for dinner.”

            “No.”

            “Let’s go workout.”

            “No.”

            Heero spent his time doing god knows what on his laptop, playing chess with Wufei, or attaching himself to me.  He had nightmares every night.  The thought of leaving the apartment made him break into a cold sweat.

            “He needs to see a doctor,” Wufei told me in the cafeteria at work, tapping his chopsticks on the edge of his bowl.

            Quatre nodded his agreement.  He’d been working more and more for the Preventers lately, and less and less in the corporate world.  “I’ve got the number of a couple of great psychiatrists.”

            “Do they make house visits?” I mumbled around a bite of my sandwich.  “Also, I don’t trust shrinks.”

            Things were getting a bit frustrating.  I worked hard all day with the recruits.  Sometimes I had to stay overnight at the training camp.  This made both Heero and Wufei grumpy at me.  They were starting to not get along and I really had no idea why.  Well I guess Wufei was tired of Heero’s depression, and Heero was just tired of Wufei being Wufei.  I could appreciate and understand both of their points of view.  But it was damn annoying being in the same apartment with them.  I came home exhausted and had to play referee, which only made me more exhausted.

            “Fuck justice and fuck you.”

            “Yuy, you will pay for that.”

            “What’re you going to do, bitch at me some more?”

            “Maybe if you actually contributed something to this household you could have a say.”

            “Fuck contributing and fuck you.”

            “Maxwellllll, control your house pet.”

            “Who are you calling a _house_ _pet_?”

            “I call them like I see them.”

            “Duo, I am going to murder your roommate in cold blood.”

            “Like you could.”

            “Fuck this, I’m getting drunk,” I said, ignoring them both and whipping out my secret supply of alcohol.

            Then something wonderful happened.

            I got drunk as hell, and suddenly everything was a-ok.

            Then something even more wonderful happened.

            Wufei produced more liquor, complaining about a headache and saying that it was the only cure, and then we all got shitfaced and were a happy family again.

            Heero smiled.  Wufei laughed.  It was kind of freaky, but I was drunk so I just went with it.  We played cards.  None of us could remember the rules.  It was fun.  It was relaxing.  It was a blur.

            I knew what I had to do for Heero.

            So I embarked on my stupidest idea ever.  I decided that Heero should be drunk.  All the time.  And then he wouldn’t be all depressed and whatever.

            It was infallible.  Really.

            Well, okay, so there were several flaws to my plan.  One of the most obvious was that drunk people weren’t necessarily happy.  Heero relaxed and seemed happier, but the problems were still there.  I just didn’t bother looking at them anymore.

            The other very obvious problem was that Heero was a horny drunk.  Even when Wufei was sitting right freaking next to us, he’d suddenly be on me like white on bread.

            “Stop,” I would say, attempting to push him away.

            But Heero would just lean in closer and whisper dirty things into my ear that made me squirm and blush.

            “I want to touch you,” he whispered, lips brushing against my ear.  “God, you make me so hard.  Let’s fuck.”

            And I spontaneously died of embarrassment.

            “You killed your stupid boyfriend,” Wufei observed drily.

            “He’s fine,” Heero said with a shrug, picking me up princess style and carrying me off to the bedroom.

            “I’m not fine at all!” I yelled when I finally came to my senses.  “Help me!”

            Wufei ignored me.  Bastard.  See if I ever covered his back again.

            Heero deposited me on the bed, and then he was kissing me and touching me and making me feel oh so nice and freaking me the fuck out.  So I punched him in the gut.

            Heero gave me an unhappy face.  Damn him and his abs of steel.

            “No,” I said.

            “I need you,” he murmured into my neck.

            “Down boy,” I growled, trying to make myself immune to his sexy advances.

            “Duo,” he said all low and sexy as he unbuttoned my jeans.

            “No, no, no!” I said, poking him sharply in the chest with every syllable.  Since our little humpathon when Heero first came to the apartment, he had backed the fuck off like a good little boy.  Also, I had told him to back off or I was slicing his dick off with my hunting knife.  We had reached a mutual understanding.

            Now he was drunk and all that had gone out the window.

            I hit him a few more times to show him how serious I was, then sent him off to Wufei.  He tried to argue with me and I dug out the hunting knife from under the bed.

            Wufei had been drinking, too, and the two of them ended up cuddling together on the couch.

            If it hadn’t been the fucking cutest thing I’ve ever seen in my life, I might have gotten jealous.

            It was even more priceless watching Wufei wake up and realizing that he was lying on the couch in a state of disarray with Heero cuddled in his arms.

            I took a few photos.  You know, just ’cause.

            Wufei swore off drinking after that.

            This was unfortunate because my first month-long trip to space was being planned for August.  That meant Heero and Wufei were going to really enjoy one another’s company for four whole weeks.

            “Don’t leave me with your damn pet,” Wufei said to me.

            “Don’t leave me with your stupid roommate,” Heero said to me on a separate occasion.

            I think they were joking.  Probably.  They were still friends.  Kind of.  Not that they ever were properly friends to start off with.  But they had a mutual understanding.  A bond of warriors.  Even better, a bond of insulting Duo.

            I don’t know why I seem to keep only asshole friends around.  You’d think I was a masochist or something.

            Dr. Trowa says that I get off on fighting with people.  I tell Dr. Trowa that I don’t get off at all unless it’s with my right hand.

            But well, yeah, I guess I do kind of enjoy fighting with Wufei.  He makes funny faces when he’s mad.  And getting Heero riled up is my specialty.

            So I guess it’s my own damn fault that my two best friends were jerks to me.  At least it helped them bond.

            “Who left this monstrosity in the sink?” Wufei raged one day, waving around a meat-encrusted frying pan.

            “Duo,” Heero said, without even looking up from his laptop.

            “You’re not supposed to sell me to the wolves,” I growled at him.

            “Maxwell!” Wufei yelled, waving the pan in front of my face.

            I stared up at Wufei from where I was lying on the couch, giving him a sulk.  “It was soaking.”

            “There was no damn water in it!”

            “Well, I knew I forgot something…”

            “Wash your damn dishes after you use them!”

            “I do…”

            “No you don’t,” Heero said.

            “Why are you siding with him?!”

            “Because you’re gross,” Heero informed me.

            “Did you just call me gross?!”

            “It’s true,” Wufei agreed, waving the dirty pan in front of me again.  “You are gross.”

            “I’d clean it… eventually,” I protested.  “And I’m not gross!”

            “You never wash the dishes,” Wufei said, waving the pan around some more.

            “You leave crumbs in bed,” Heero chimed in.

            “You leave your sweaty, nasty clothes everywhere,” Wufei said, and seemed to be warming up to the topic.

            “It’s the worst when it rains and he just throws his wet socks anywhere,” Heero said, finally looking up from his screen to give Wufei a knowing look.

            “I found one in the fridge once,” Wufei confided in him.

            “I was getting a drink and I forgot it…”

            “They were on top of my steak,” Wufei continued.

            “He put them back in the drawer with my clean clothes once,” Heero said.

            Wufei shook his head in commiseration.

            I glowered at them both.

            Heero turned around from where he was sitting on the floor in front of me, smiling into my glower.

            I snarled at him.

            Heero grinned wider, leaning in and giving me a quick kiss.  “Love you,” he said, softly so that only I could hear.

            I flushed, my expression immediately softening.

            “Wash this damn thing or I’m kicking you out!” Wufei yelled from the kitchen.

            “I’ll kick you out!” I yelled back.

            Heero shook his head at me, still grinning.

            “I’ll kick you out next,” I growled at him.

            “Do you even listen to yourself talk?”

            “Yes.”

            Heero gave me another kiss, this one more lingering.

            “Still mad?” he asked as he pulled away.

            “Who says I’m mad?” I asked.

            Heero poked me between the eyes, smoothing the wrinkle in my brow.  “We’re just teasing you.”

            “I’m not,” Wufei said, coming back into the living room and sitting in his recliner.  He crossed his arms over his chest and glared at me.  “You’re a slob.”

            I stuck my tongue out at him.

            “Taste like an ashtray, too,” Heero said, sliding his finger down to boop my nose.

            I raised an eyebrow at him.

            “My god, the smoke,” Wufei said, touching a hand to his temple like my smoking was causing physical pain to him.  “It lingers.”

            “I never smoke in the damn apartment,” I muttered.

            Heero traced the contours of my hand slowly with his index finger.  He didn’t usually do nice, gentle things like that, and it made me tingly.

            “It’s in your clothes, it’s in your hair,” Wufei complained.

            “In your mouth,” Heero agreed.

            “Well think about it from my side,” I said, trying to work up a thoroughly affronted look, but Heero was making it kind of difficult with that goddamn magic touch of his.  “I have to breathe your crappy, smoke-free air, and kiss Heero’s toothpastey, smoke-free mouth.  It’s harder on me than on you lame non-smokers.”

            “Maxwell, your comebacks are embarrassing,” Wufei informed me.

            “Your face is embarrassing,” I shot back.

            Wufei just arched his eyebrow in that superior way of his.

            I turned lazy eyes to Heero’s.  “Defend my honor.”

            “You hate it when I try to fight your battles,” Heero pointed out calmly, sliding that finger agonizingly slowly along the slope of my thumb.  “‘Heeeeero, I can do it myself.’”

            “Why are you making me sound like Relena?” I growled.  “And how the fuck much of that vodka did you drink?” I asked, reaching over to pick up the bottle from the coffee table.  A tiny bit of liquid sloshed around in the bottom.

            “Enough,” Heero said, looking pleased with himself.

            “Too much?” I suggested.

            Heero started giving me wolf eyes and I pushed him back so I could get up and go to the kitchen.  Time to wash the stupid pan.

            “You know, he doesn’t clean the lint out of the dryer, either,” Wufei commented.

            “He never empties the garbage out of the bottom of the sink.”

            “He leaves the clothes in the washer until they turn moldy.”

            “He doesn’t make the bed or change the sheets.  Ever.”

            “He puts leftovers in the back of the refrigerator and forgets about them until they spoil.”

            “His ha-”

            “Yuy, you finish that fucking sentence and I will stick this sponge down your throat so deep that all you can do is choke and die,” I hissed from the kitchen, waving the soapy sponge around.

            I wasn’t actually bothered by their teasing, and I thought it was nice that they had something that they agreed about.  I just wished they could move on and find a new topic that they agreed on.

            Ironically, the other topic that they agreed on was ‘please, Duo, don’t go to space’.

            “Don’t go.”

            “It’s work.”

            “Then I’m coming with you.”

            I almost said, ‘Yeah, okay, fine.’  Instead I said, “Christ, Heero, act like a man,” which earned me a very sulky glare.

            “Don’t go.”

            “Not you, too.”

            “I’m not baby-sitting Yuy for a month.”

            “Call up Quatre.  Or Relena.”

            “And you need to do your half of the chores.”

            “I suck at chores and do them all wrong, remember?”

            “Idiot.”

            “Why the hell am I an idiot?”

            Wufei just sulked.

            “It’s like dealing with children,” I informed Quatre.

            “No, just two socially inept men who love you,” Quatre said with a grin.

            “Ugh,” I said.

            So off I went to space with my ragtag cadets in tow.  Miss Noin came from Mars to help, and an agent McAdams who was in charge of the L4 area was leading the training.  The Sweepers also contributed to some of the flight training, which was under the table but ridiculously hilarious for me.  It’s always fun to mix military types with well… my type.

            At some point while I was gone, Wufei forced Heero into that computer job at the Preventers.  One day everything was normal, the next day Heero was ending our phone call early because he had to get up at 5 for work.

            “Huh?” was all I could get out before he hung up.

            I didn’t fully realize the implications of that until much later.  When I was around, I let Heero get away with whatever.  When we were separated, he finally got over his people phobia and started acting like a human being again.  The fact that we were horrible influences on one another had yet to dawn on me.

            Trowa and Quatre both came to the training center for special sessions.  Trowa and I took the cadets drinking after an especially brutal anti-g session, which was nice and relaxing and made me start to realize how stressed out I’d been lately back on earth.

            “Getting the itch?” Trowa asked quietly, nudging my knee with his own.

            “What itch?” I asked.

            “The itch to move on?”

            I blinked at him.

            “Duo, you’re not really one to stay in one place for long.”

          “Yeah, but…” I blinked again, trying to put my tumbling thoughts into order.  “Wu… and Heero… and shit.”

            “Yeah,” Trowa agreed, giving my braid the lightest of tugs.  “As long as you’re happy.”

            I went back to earth wondering whether or not I was happy.


	12. Chapter 12

            Wufei and Heero both glowered at me at the spaceport, then turned around in unison heading for the car.

            “Thanks for the warm welcome,” I muttered, chasing after them.

            They took the front seats, leaving me and my bag in the back.

            ‘These assholes aren’t even talking to me,’ I texted to Quatre, who’d come back earthside the week before.

            ‘That’s their way of saying they missed you,’ Quatre texted back.

            ‘Troooowa my tall and elegant cyclops, I misss yoooooou,’ I texted to Trowa.

            He ignored me.  He does that sometimes.  Or he just didn’t have his phone.  But he was probably ignoring me.  He did that when he thought I was being ridiculous.

            Trowa often thinks that I’m being ridiculous.

            When we were partners for the Preventers, I started calling him Deathscythe Junior.  Every time I called him that, he completely ignored me.  I finally nagged him about it when he was drunk, and he said he hated it because it sounded like something I would call my penis.

            And thus my penis was christened Deathscythe Junior.

            I tried out a series of nicknames that were all ignored.  Then somehow we came up with Bloomsy and Maxy, both of which stuck.

            Despite my love of nicknaming everyone, Trowa was the only person who called me by a nickname.  It gave me a warm, fuzzy feeling deep inside.

            Trowa also ignored the majority of my texts pertaining to Quatre.

            ‘Quat and I are snuggling in front of the fireplace, why don’t you join us????’

            Ignored.

            ‘Who wears short shorts?  Quatre wears short shorts!  Wish you were at the beach with us~’

            Ignored.

            ‘I’m going to tell Quatre that he’s gay.’

            ‘You keep your mouth shut or I’m putting a bullet in your brain.’

            Well, that one wasn’t ignored.

            ‘Tro, he needs to know.’

            ‘Maxwell, this isn’t a joke.  Don’t say a damn word to him.’

            It depressed me that Quatre and Trowa weren’t skipping off into the sunset together.  They didn’t even speak for the couple of weeks that Trowa was on earth after the failed love confession.  Trowa went back to the circus with nothing resolved.

            I of course had mixed feelings towards the Trowa and Quatre love love relationship.  Before Heero and I broke up, I supported them wholeheartedly.  After the break up, I got pretty jaded.  The one thing I was sure of, though, was that Quatre was gay and he needed to goddamn admit it.

            “Quatre, how’s your girlfriend?” I asked as we sat in the Preventer’s cafeteria.  Quatre was helping me with the week’s training, but now that we had gotten all our programs worked out, we could finally have a nice, personal conversation.

            “Oh,” Quatre said.  “We broke up.”

            “Really?” I said.  I probably didn’t sound surprised at all.  Because I wasn’t.  “What happened?”

            “It just wasn’t working out,” Quatre said, waving it off.

            “Oh, that’s too bad.”

            “Duo, you’re a terrible liar.”

            “Yeah,” I agreed.  “So, Trowa…”

            “I’m not talking about that with you,” Quatre said, a sullen cast taking over his features.

            “I was just discussing our mutual acquaintance.”

            “Cut the bullshit.  I know exactly what you’re getting at.”

            “Wow, you have been spending way too much time with the commander.  You sound exactly like her.  Except she just has this way of saying my name.  _Special Agent Maxwell_.  The disdain, the disapproval, the disappointment.  You’ve gotta work on that part.”

            “ _Special Agent Maxwell_.”

            “Ugh, chills.  Okay, you’ve got that down pat, too.”

            Quatre just raised his rich boy eyebrow at me and put me to shame.

            I nibbled on my sandwich quietly until the shame went away.  “He misses you.”

            Quatre’s eyes were ice, but something was softening in him.  “I’m not talking about it with you.”

            “What’s wrong with talking about it with me?”

            “Because you’re on his side.”

            I blinked.  “I’m not on anyone’s side.”

            “You’re closer to Trowa than you are to me.”

            I tilted my head to the side.  “I am?”

            “I told you to cut the bullshit.”

            “Quat…” I was genuinely perplexed.

            Wufei dropped his tray next to mine with a clatter.

            “Huh?” I said.  “I thought you were out in the field?”

            “Po blew our cover,” Wufei growled, sitting down next to me.

            “No, Chang blew my cover,” Sally hissed, slamming her tray down next to Quatre.

            “Is this some kind of marriage counselling thing?” I asked, offering a hopeful smile at Quatre.

            He wasn’t looking at me.

            Quatre took over his father’s business after the war.  He hated it, but he thought it was his duty.  After Epyon de Telos, he joined the Preventers as a consulting special agent.  He partnered with the commander herself when he went into the field, but mostly did tactical and engineering work at the office.  He moved the Winners’ earth headquarters to Germany so he could continue to straddle both worlds, working both jobs a.k.a. he became a complete workaholic.

            Quatre’s sister Dalia ran the L4 branch of the business, and within the last year Quatre had slowly started handing more and more duties over to her at Trowa’s urging.  He was still a workaholic, though, and I guess we kind of drifted apart.

           Quatre and I stayed the closest after the war.  Even during the war, we were the closest among the five of us.  We had a personal relationship, whereas with the other three it was just business.

            I was with Quatre after Heero self-detonated.  That was a real bonding experience.  Before we had to flee for our lives from the Maguanac village, Quat and I had a nice heart-to-heart.

            “You and 01 were close, huh?” Quatre mused.

            “What?” I said, startled into looking up at him.  “What do mean?  Where’d you get that from?!”

            Quatre just tapped his chest and nodded knowingly.  Fucking space heart.  I bet he fakes it.  I bet he just uses all his rich boy money to spy on us all, then freak us out with his ‘intuitions’.  There is no other explanation.

            “Look, we just did some missions together and… I mean we didn’t… he hates… hated me… and… fuck.”

            Quatre pulled me into a hug while I very manfully restrained myself from blubbering like a baby.  Seeing Heero self-detonate was just one of those images in my head that would never go away, nestled in between Sister Helen lying dead in the ruins of the church and Solo dying in my arms with the useless vaccines scattered around us.  I have a lovely scrapbook of memories.

            Heero wasn’t actually dead, but I didn’t know it at the time.

            So I held onto Quatre and took some deep breaths and calmed myself the fuck down.

            “Shit,” I said.

            Quatre loosened his hold so that his hands just rested lightly on my shoulders while he looked into my eyes.  “He did what we couldn’t.  We have to keep fighting for him.”

            “Y-yeah…” I said, starting to feel composed again.  “I’ll miss the way the spandex clung to his perfect ass, though.”

            Quatre sputtered out a laugh, blushing.

            “You know what I’m talking about,” I said with a pleased smile.

            “I never met him before,” Quatre said, shaking his head.

            “Damn, you missed out,” I said, and my smile suddenly crumbled.  “He really was… a shitty guy… with a great ass.  Musta been made outta gundanium ’cause I saw him jump out of fucking like 50 story buildings and live to tell about it.  He really was shitty.  He got like mad at me for saving his life.  And he never had anything nice ta fuckin’ say, like he thought I was an idiot or somethin’.  And he stole parts from my gundam, can you get any shittier than that?!  But for some stupid reason I really liked the guy.  I felt like he could really be someone, ya know?  Like he could change the fucking world.  And now he’s gone.”

            “I’m sorry, Duo,” Quatre murmured.  Then we had this really gay moment where he kissed my cheek.

            I blinked at him, and there was this acknowledgement between us.  That look said it all.

            ‘I acknowledge that you harbored homosexual lust towards Heero Yuy, as I, Quatre Raberba Winner, am also a homosexual and understand your proclivities.’

            I did not imagine this.  Call it my own fucking space heart.

            Anyway, the topic changed, and then there were some bombs and shit and the moment was over, but I will never forget that look in Quatre’s eyes.

            Quatre and I stayed close after the first war.  He was on L4 and I was on L2, so we actually met up when we could.  Quat was working his little Arabian ass off, but he always made time for me if I showed up unexpectedly at his doorway.

            It was after we joined the Preventers that things started to change and we just kind of drifted apart from how close we were.  I got a lot closer with Trowa.  I also started to realize how fucking crazy I was, and I guess I kind of wanted to keep my shit out of Quat’s face.  I guess I didn’t think that he would understand.  It’s not to say that Quatre didn’t have problems like the rest of us.  I mean that whole Wing Zero thing showed a pretty deranged side of him.  I think that’s why him and Commander Une work so well together.  It’s like 5 or 6 agents for the price of 2.  But I dunno.  Quatre is Quatre.  He’s not Trowa-level fucked up.  So I guess I didn’t want to disappoint him with my shortcomings.

            We drifted apart.

            I mean, we’re still friends.  We’re just not as close as we used to be.

            It doesn’t mean I don’t know Quatre’s deep dark secret.

            Maybe some people think that I’m being judgmental or some shit by insisting that Quatre is gay.  But the reason I say it isn’t the pink shirts or the musical duets with Trowa or the _feelings_ and the overall aura of gay that surrounds him.  I mean, all that doesn’t hurt.  But I understand that people aren’t stereotypes.  People think I’m gay because of the braid.  I’m gay because of Heero.  I like girls, too.  I can have a braid and like girls.  I get where Q is coming from when he gets frustrated with people stereotyping him.

            But if you didn’t want people to call you gay, then you shouldn’t spend thirty minutes on a drunken rant about the perfection of Trowa Barton.  His lips, his abs, his _flexibility_.  About how you wouldn’t mind playing twister with him.

            So maybe he didn’t come right out and say that he wanted to have sweaty horizontal relations with Trowa (well he kind of did with the Twister thing, but, ya know, sweaty _naked_ horizontal relations with Trowa), but he said it in his own way.

            And that’s why it pisses me off when Quatre pretends to be straight.  All the rest of us are off screwing guys (well, besides Wu, but I think he’s asexual) (and besides me because I don’t actually screw guys, I just kiss Heero with a lot of tongue), so what’s there left to pretend?  It was apparently a prerequisite to becoming a gundam pilot.  Must be at least somewhat gay.  Wufei used to have that mancrush on Heero before Heero went crazy.  We’ve all had our gay moments.  Just embrace it.

            So even if Quatre didn’t want to talk about the Trowa Thing, tough shit.

            Besides, he was so damn meddlesome with Heero and me.

            “Duo, why don’t you come and have dinner with Heero and me?”

            “Duo, Heero would love to see you.”

            “Duo, Heero’s still not over you.”

            “Quatre, want to visit Trowa with me next month?”

            “Quatre, Trowa would love to see you.”

            “Quatre, you’re gay.”

            Quatre punched me in the face.

            We’d been walking to the garage together after work, and I suddenly found myself on my ass.

            “What the fuck?” I yelled, cradling my aching eye socket.  That hurt like a bitch.  Little Quatre could still throw a punch.

            And he looked down at me with his rage-filled, teary blue eyes, and I just didn’t get it.

            Quatre stomped off and zoomed away in his expensive car.

            “Of course he punched you in the face,” Heero said with a snort, pouring me a drink and passing it across his counter to me despite my protestations.

            “What do you mean, ‘of course’?” I growled, finally taking the drink and slinking off into the living room.

            “You’re kind of an asshole,” Heero said, sitting down on the arm of the chair I was currently occupying.

            “I’m sorry, _me_?  _I’m_ an asshole?”

            “Yes,” Heero said, smiling and leaning in to kiss the top of my head.  “I appreciate your honesty, but others find it a bit difficult to swallow.”

            “You’re a drunken manwhore,” I said.

            Heero shrugged.  “Yeah.”

            “So you still appreciate my honesty?”

            “Yes.”

            “You need to go to rehab.”

            “Probably.”

            “And you’re fucked in the head.”

            “Yes.”

            “You’re still appreciating?”

            “Well, I’d rather you had something nice to say, but at least you don’t simper and lie to my face like everyone else.”

            “You wish I had something nice to say?” I asked with a snort.  “Okay, Miss Manners.”

            “You need another drink,” Heero said, taking my empty glass from me.

            “When the hell did I drink that?” I muttered, watching him disappear back into the kitchen.  “I don’t need another drink.  Why are you trying to get me drunk?”

            “It would take a lot more drinks to get you drunk,” Heero said, returning with a refilled glass.  “I like drinking with you.”

            “You shouldn’t be drinking,” I said.

            Heero sat across from me, swirling his Jack around in his glass before taking a swallow.

            “Defiant bastard.”

            Heero smiled that cute, pleased-with-himself smile.

            “Why are you being nice and cute?” I growled suspiciously.

            “You think I’m cute?” Heero asked, his smile brightening.

            “Stop that, dammit,” I growled, staring down at my empty glass.  “And when the hell did I drink this?!”

            Heero got up and disappeared into the kitchen, this time returning with the bottle of Jack.  He dumped some in my glass and took a drink from the bottle.

            “I don’t need any more.”

            “So I should drink the bottle by myself?”

            “No…”

            Heero shrugged, lounging across from me again and taking periodic drags from the bottle.

            I held out my empty glass for refills to help protect Heero’s liver, keeping easy pace with his drinking.

            “So why are you supporting Quatre and his bruising of my beautiful face?” I asked, gesturing towards my black eye.

            “You look kind of sexy all beat up.”

            “I’m not beat up,” I started to protest, then paused.  “Wait, so you’re on Quatre’s side ’cause he made me look all sexy?” I asked, staring at him with my very unsexy and in fact pretty gross black eye.

            “No,” Heero said, eyes twinkling as he studied my face.  “And I’m not on his side.  I just understand his position.”

            “Bottom?”

            Heero almost choked on his whiskey.  “Now that was uncalled for,” he said, trying to stop sniggering.

            “Yeah, Quat could be a top,” I mused.

            “Duo, do you remember what happened when Quatre piloted Wing Zero?”

            “Uh, I guess,” I said.

            “He thought he killed Trowa,” Heero said.

            “Well, yeah, but then I found Trowa?”

            “Duo, he thought he killed him.  He had to live with that.  It changed him.”

            “Okay…”

            “Duo, come here.”

            “Huh?”

            He patted the couch cushion next to him.

            I eyed him.

            “You’re too far away to refill your glass.”

            “Goddamn, you’re lazy,” I said, shuffling over and sitting next to him.  I held out my glass and he filled it.  I took a drink, noticing that the bottle was basically empty and wondering how much of it that I’d drunk.

            “Actually, I just wanted you closer,” Heero said, giving me a smirk.

            I rolled my eyes at him.  “Anyway.  Quatre.”

            Heero finished off the bottle and set it on the coffee table.  “Yeah.  Quatre.  He has his priorities, and his own happiness isn’t among them.”

            “But that’s dumb.”

            “That’s his choice.”

            “Trowa loves him.”

            “I love you.”

            “I… huh?”

            “You won’t be with me for stupid reasons.  Why are you holding it against Quatre?”

            “Wait, hold it, no.  These are two completely different situations.”

            “In what way?”

            “You don’t even really like me!” I snapped.

            Heero frowned at me.  “I don’t know how many times I have to tell you that I love you.”

            “And how many times do you have to tell me that I’m a useless moron?  Or parade your trysts in front of my face?”

            “You say dumb things sometimes,” Heero said, but he had that wounded puppy dog look going on to stop me from throwing my glass at him.

            “Ugh,” I said, throwing back the rest of my drink and standing up.  “I’m gonna take a cab home.”

            Heero grabbed my wrist, stopping me in my tracks.  “I love you.”

            “Stop, no, no way, Heero,” I said, trying to wrench my wrist free from his iron grip.  “We are done.  Over.  Stop with the melodramatic love confessions.”

            “No,” Heero growled, standing up.  “You’re complaining about Quatre.  Maybe you should complain about yourself.”

            I blinked.  “Are you drunk?”

            “Probably.”

            “I’m not gonna sleep with you.”

            “Who was asking you to?”

            “That’s what you do when you’re drunk and you don’t have a bootycall lined up.  You tell me you love me and try to have sex with me.”

            “I do not.”

            “Uh, yeah you do.  You just did it like a week ago.”

            “I did not.”

            “You tried to stick your hand down the front of my pants and I stomped on your toe?  Any of this ringing a bell?”

            “Oh,” Heero said.  “My foot did kind of hurt…”

            “Heero, you don’t even remember half the shit you do when you’re drunk anymore.  It’s a problem.”

            “I don’t care what I do.”

            “Well you can be pretty shitty to people.”

            “I was shitty to people before I was an alcoholic.”

            “Heero…”

            “Duo…”

            We stared at each other.

            Heero bit his lip.

            I kissed him.

            I’m an idiot.

            No, really.  I might be the most fucking stupid person in the earth sphere.

            Heero pulled me closer, then backed us onto the couch.

            I just wanted him closer and closer and he was shoving up my shirt and I was kissing his neck and groping his ass because my god, Heero’s ass, and he was sucking on my lip and unzipping my pants and what the fuck, “Heero!”

            Heero stared down at me, blue eyes flickering in annoyance.  “What?”

            “No.”

            “Why the hell not?”

            “We broke up.”

            “Then why are we always kissing?”

            “Because I’m confused and needy.”

            “Are you just using me?”

            “You’re the one using me!” I snarled, pushing at his chest.

            “You’re the one who won’t go away!” Heero snarled back.

            “So you want me to go away?!”

            “No,” Heero said in a quiet voice.

            “Then what do you want?”

            “I want us to be together.”

            “It’s not going to happen.”

            “Then go away, Duo!” Heero snapped, shoving himself off of the couch abruptly.  “Just go the fuck away.  Stop throwing everything I want in my face and then telling me I can’t have it!”

            I stared at him.  I didn’t have a comeback for that.  “Fine,” I said, getting up and readjusting my clothes, throwing on my coat, and heading straight for the door.

            I hadn’t even reached the street before he caught up to me.

            “I didn’t mean it,” he whispered, hugging me from behind.

            “Maybe you were right.”

            “No.  Never.  Don’t go, I need you.”

            “All we do is hurt each other.”

            “I can’t live without you.”

            The weight of his words felt like it would crush me.  “Don’t say that.”

            “It’s true.”

            “You’re making me your prisoner.”

            Heero let go of me and I turned around to face him, reaching out to touch his cheek gently.

            “Duo?” he said, eyes squinched in confusion.

            “You’ll be fine without me.”

            “No.”

            “Yes.”

            “No.”

            “Yes, so shut up, I’m not having a two year old’s argument with you.”

            “Come back upstairs.”

            “I can’t.”

            “Duo.”

            “I’m calling a cab.  I’ll talk to you tomorrow, okay?”

            Heero shook his head.

            “It’s what I’m doing, so go back upstairs like a good little boy and I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

            “I want to talk now.”

            “Well you can’t always have your way.”

            “Duo.”

            “Heero, I’m tired.  Just let it be.”

            Heero let out a very angry sounding growl and turned around to stomp back up the stairs.

            I rolled my eyes.  He was such a child.

            Then I pulled out my cell phone and called a cab.

            I sat on the curb and waited, cell phone in hand.

            ‘Hey, Tro.  How’s the space training going?  You know what would make it even better?  Me!!!!  See you soon?????’

            I pressed send, staring up into the stars.  Most of them were faint with all the ambient lighting of the city, but I could still see the twinkle of the colonies.

            I’d been on earth for a while now.  It seemed about time to head home again.


	13. Chapter 13

            My job at the Preventers was that I basically ran two month boot camps for new recruits.  The program was designed by myself and Miss Noin (I think she’s Mrs. Peacecraft now, but whatever, it’s like how I still call Trowa ‘Barton’), and I was usually with the newbies from Monday to Friday, eight to three with a 30 minute lunch break.  Then I got to do paperwork for an hour, which mostly meant hanging out in Wufei and Sally’s office, if they weren’t in the field, and enjoying the company of my co-workers while I procrastinated my work.  And by enjoying their company I mean tormenting Wufei with the help of the lovely Miss Po.

            The structure of it all was a bit much for me, but the thing about Preventers was that while it was like a military organization, it wasn’t actually a military organization.  We didn’t have to salute or wear dumb archaic looking uniforms.  I had my agents’ jacket for official business, but otherwise could wear whatever I wanted to work.

            My training program wasn’t about building some brainwashed slaves to do Commander Une’s bidding.  It was about making them physically and mentally ready to identify and contain any and all threats to the peace of the earth and the colonies.  They’d recently tagged in Mars to the job description as well, not that there was really anything on that godforsaken planet that anyone would want, despite the smooth progression of the terraforming.

            So I put the cadets through their physical paces, but we also studied history.  We studied the Eve Wars, but we also studied the wars from before we were born, from the early years of the AC timeline, and even before that, into AD and BC.  We studied terrorist attacks.  We studied peace leaders.  We studied the successes and the failures of human history.

            We also studied fun stuff like mechanics and engineering and computers.  All cadets needed basic skills in these areas.  After the boot camps, they could begin more specialized, on-the-job training.  I laid the foundation for their future work with the Preventers.

            Of course, I didn’t get to mold the impressionable young minds all on my own.  I had my little crack team of Agent McGill, who had worked with Sally during the war in the resistance movement, Quatre, mechanical and tactical genius extraordinaire, Agent Park, a former Treize Faction member who had a similar background to Noin’s, and our hilarious computer instructor Heero Yuy.

            Heero had joined the team shortly after my first training boot camp in space.  He was the worst teacher ever.  He just did things and then stared at you expectantly, like you were supposed to memorize everything he did and repeat it back perfectly.  I had to train Heero in how to train, which was very tiresome because Heero didn’t understand the concept of patience.

            I tried to tell Une that it was a bad idea, but she said she didn’t want to waste such a valuable resource and that I should make it work.  She smiled gleefully as she said it.  Sadistic bitch.

            The space training program had a focus on piloting and anti-gravity maneuvers.  We also taught ship maintenance and repairs.

There was also a second training facility that ran two month boot camps similar to my earth ones for recruits in space.  This is what Trowa had just started running.

            It’s where I was headed.

            “ _Special Agent Maxwell_ , I can’t say that it’s been a pleasure,” Une said, leaning forward in her chair to rest her chin on her hands.  “But it will be difficult transitioning the training team.”

            “Aw, shucks, you know how to make a guy blush,” I said.

            “Yes, well.”                                                                                                           

            I shifted in my seat.  “I’ll do whatever you need me to do to get McGill to take over.  But I think it’s time for me to move on.”

            “Because of Special Agent Yuy.”

            “Ye- what, no.”

            Une raised an eyebrow at me.

            “I just think it’s time to go back to space.”

            Une stared me down.

            I squirmed again.  I don’t think I ever got over how gleefully she ordered my execution during the war.

            “Special Agent Barton and I discussed the possibility when he was here in February,” Une said.

            I waited for her to go on.  And waited.

            “I want you to finish up the current camp, but pass leadership to Agent McGill and work as her assistant,” Une said.  “I’ll have you make your transfer in June.”

            “A’ight, that works for me.”

            Une looked at me with that _look_ of hers.  “Have you told Agent Chang yet?”

            “Uh, well, kinda sorta not completely, but it’s on my list of things to do.”

            “Warn me before you do,” she said, giving me a dismissive gesture.

            “Sure thing, Commander,” I said, happy to make my escape.

            “ _Special Agent Maxwell_ ,” she said as I reached the door.

            I sighed, turning around.  “Yes?”

            She studied my face for a moment before speaking.  “I’m probably going to have to fire Heero.”

            I sighed, plodding back and sinking into my vacated chair again.  “Don’t put that on me.”

            “You’re the reason I haven’t already.”

            “Seriously, do you have to go there?” I groaned, dropping my head hands.

            “Because I’m sure you wouldn’t be a pain in my ass if I just fire him as soon as you’re gone.”

            I sighed again, looking up at her.  “He’s a good worker.”

            “When he shows up.”

            “He’s a valuable resource.”

            “One of the most valuable in the entire organization.”

            “But you’re going to fire him?”

            “His quality of work is always superior, he’s even become a competent trainer under your tutelage.  But he comes to work hungover, if he shows up at all.  And if I give him a drug test…”

            “Shit,” I said.  “Please don’t.”

            Une gave me another long look.

            “He’ll never be able to get another job…”

            “He needs a wakeup call.”

            “Yeah, but… could it be a more gentle one?”

            “ _Special Agent Maxwell_.”

            “Shit, okay.  But…”

            “I think it’s good that you’re going to L4.”

            “Huh?”

            “Heero needs to grow up.  And you do, too.”

            “Ha, good luck with that.”

            “ _Duo_.”

            “What?”

            “You’re an important asset to the Preventers, as well.  An asset to peace.  So take care of yourself.”

            “O…kay…”

            “Dismissed.”

            So it was decided.  In June of AC 202, I was going to transfer from Preventers Europe to Preventers L4.

            The first time I went to work in space two years before, Heero and Wufei were miserable little bitches about it.  I was really looking forward to telling them about it now that the move was going to be permanent.

            They were cute, though, when I came back.  I guess that’s why I get along with Heero and Wufei, while most normal people don’t.  And despite the fact that they’re jerks to me.  Because the two of them are super cutie patooties deep down inside.

            After picking me up from the spaceport and basically ignoring me the entire drive home despite the fact that it was our reunion after a month, Wufei suddenly pulled the car into the parking lot of my favorite pizza place.  Heero got out of the car and returned with two boxes of my beloved stuffed pizza.  They continued to be sullen jerks while serving me pizza and beer and renting a cheesy comedy despite the fact that both of them hated comedies.

After the pizza was finished, a bowl of popcorn was plopped in my lap, and my two boys sat on either side of me, munching on popcorn.

My emotionally retarded boys never had anything nice to say to me, but they tried their best to show me that they cared, and that’s why I loved them anyway.  I’m sure Dr. Trowa would have a lot to say about that, but he was a jerk to me, too, so he couldn’t really bring it up.

            I was still mad at him about that time on X-18999 when he helped Heero throw me in a prison cell and left me to die.  Dick.

            Anyway, before we went to bed I decided to give Wufei a big ol’ hug, which resulted in him sputtering and pretending to be angry while making no move to remove me.

            Heero was much more genuinely angry, glaring a hole into both of our backs.

            I gave Wufei a friendly spank and scampered off to Heero, giving him a nice, lingering tonguing.  Heero, being his caveman-ass self, took this as an invitation to haul me off to the bedroom.

            I was in a good enough mood to not get mad about it.  I mean, pizza, beer, a movie, and Heero and Wufei after one month of no Heero and Wufei?

            “Night, Wuffie-Wu!” I called from where I was hanging over Heero’s shoulder.

            “Ugh,” Wufei answered, closing his bedroom door with more-than-necessary force.

            Heero kicked the door shut behind us with an answering slam, then sat me on the bed and straddled my lap, laying his head against my shoulder.

            “Hey,” I said, wrapping my arms around him in a hug.

            “Hi,” he said quietly.

            I ran my fingers through his hair, noting that he had quickly gone from sullen to caveman to sad little boy.  “What’s up, Heero?”

            Heero shook his head, arms tightening around me.

            “I missed you,” I said, giving his hair a friendly ruffle.

            Heero was quiet.

            “I’m glad you got a job,” I said, rubbing his back.  “Now we can be co-workers and you can help terrorize my cadets.”

            I felt a light tug on my braid.  I don’t know why Heero decided that my hair was a good security blanket, but he loved wrapping it around his hand and clinging to it in times of need.

            “Talk to me,” I said gently.

            There was another light tug on my braid.  “It’s hard.”

            “What’s hard?”

            “Living.”

            I pulled in a breath sharply and let it out.  “What’s wrong?”

            Heero shook his head again.

            I continued to rub his back, leaning against the wall and staring into my room.  Heero’s laptop was on my desk, his clothes in my hamper.  Two pairs of his sneakers were lined up in front of the closet.  Heero was neat, almost to an obsessive compulsive degree, so I hadn’t really noticed before how he had slowly started to take over my room.

            It made me nervous.  Our relationship was moving much too fast for me, to a point that I just couldn’t keep up sometimes.  And yet when Heero wasn’t around, I missed him.  I’d thought about him a lot on L4.

            And he needed me.  That much was evident as he clung to me with now shaky arms.

            That’s what I’d thought at the time, anyway.

            So I soothed him with back rubs and little kisses, and cuddled him to sleep.  I woke up to his sleepy smile, and it just filled my chest with warmth.

            We were the dopiest couple ever, which Wufei could attest to.

            “Yuy, Maxwell is perfectly capable of feeding himself,” he fumed over breakfast.

            Heero paused, a forkful of omelet dangling in front of my mouth.  “Well, yes,” he agreed, then continued the forward motion of his fork.

            I opened my mouth and accepted the food, chewing it thoughtfully.  “Heero’s tastes better.”

            “Then switch plates!” Wufei snapped.

            “That wouldn’t be any fun,” I said, grinning at Wufei as I offered Heero a bite of my omelet.

            “Isn’t it about time Yuy found his own place?” Wufei muttered, opening up the newspaper and disappearing from sight.

            I blinked, watching Heero eat from my fork.  “His own place?”

            Heero offered me another bite.

            “The two of you sharing a room is not… appropriate.”

            I choked on the omelet I was chewing.

            Heero just rolled his eyes.

            Wufei is the world’s biggest prude.  He blanches at mentions of pornography, and he reprimands Sally at all the Preventers functions they attend together because her shoulders are bared.  He gets embarrassed when I walk around the apartment in nothing but a towel.  He also gets embarrassed when he sees girls on the streets with their tatas out.  I think that basically the sight of skin embarrasses Wufei.

            And he is a strong believer in no sex before marriage.  Or so he says.  Except that he likes to tease me about my virgin status because it’s one of the few ways he can get under my skin.

            “Christ,” I said, patting my chest to try and stop choking.

            Heero offered me some juice and I downed it.

            Wufei finally put the newspaper down and took off his reading glasses.  His cheeks were a rosy red.  “Heero and I have already discussed this, Duo.”

            “Woah, woah, what kind of discussion was this?”

            “Wufei thinks he’s your father,” Heero said.

            “That’s kind of weird,” I said, brow crinkling.

            “Right?” Heero agreed.

            I grinned at him.  I loved to see his adorable sense of humor.

            “I did not spawn that filthy-mouthed American,” Wufei snarled.

            “Uh, cool?”

            “I’ve said everything that needs to be said,” Wufei announced, standing up abruptly and making a beeline for his room.

            “What crawled up his butt?” I murmured.

            Heero leaned in and kissed my cheek.  “Doesn’t matter.”

            Apparently Wufei and Heero had fought a lot while I was away, which was why they were so cranky when I came back.  Like it was my fault they were two little kids who couldn’t behave.  Wufei had forced Heero to take Une’s job offer, and was also trying to force him to get his own place.  Beyond deeming our sharing of a bed ‘inappropriate’, Wu was also concerned about the co-dependent aspect of our relationship.  He was the first to see it, but I thought he was just being a jerk.

            Getting Heero out of the house and off to work every weekday seemed to get him to be a little less emo sometimes.  He liked his job.  He liked machines.  They made sense to him, more so than people.  Then Une started pawning him off on me twice a week to work with the cadets, which was awkward.

            Heero seriously sucked at teaching, and I had to keep explaining to him that just demonstrating something once was not teaching.  The recruits were intimidated by him to boot, which was kind of fun but mostly tiresome.  I wanted them to learn all the necessary skills they needed for the field, and if they couldn’t understand a damn thing that Heero taught them then it was all a waste of time.

            Heero got very stressed out over the training.  He was drinking a lot, and sometimes stealing my cigarettes for a quick smoke.  Wufei said he’d started smoking when I went to space.  Despite proclaiming my mouth an ashtray, he found the smell comforting.

            My next trip to space was planned for November.

            “Don’t go,” Heero would murmur to me in the safety of my room, clutching my braid and looking as pathetic as could be.

            “It’s my job.”

            I don’t know what crippled Heero into that weak, needy person, but I thought that if I just supported him that everything would be fine.

            He even started getting better at teaching.  And he glowered less at the recruits.  They actually started learning things from him.

            “Take care of Heero for me, okay?” I told Wufei as he saw me off at the spaceport for my next trip to L4.  Heero was at work and had saw me off in the morning with puppy dog eyes and a very long kiss.

            “He’s a person, not a dog,” Wufei said.

            “Sometime I wonder…”

            Wufei shook his head, then surprised me by pulling me into a hug.  Wufei never hugged me.  He stood by passively while I hugged him, but he never hugged me.  “Take care of yourself, Maxwell.”

            “Y-yeah…”

            I liked working in space.  Sometimes you just need to experience some anti-g’s.  I could also spend more time with Trowa, the Sweepers, and Hilde, who I was trying very doggedly to repair my relationship with.  Heero didn’t like that very much, but oh well.

            I came back to earth feeling kind of good, though very happy to see my sullen roommate and boyfriend.  They showered me with tokens of their affection just like the last time, all the while pretending that they were not ecstatic to see me.

            It was December and the holidays were coming up.  Heero and I took some vacation days to go spend in Sanc again.  Heero still had anxiety about flying, but he wanted to see Relena.

            Their relationship confused me.

            Heero rarely said anything to Relena.  She called him often, talking his ear off while he just grunted or stared into space.  But Heero looked forward to those calls.  Maybe he was the masochist, I don’t really know.  All I knew was that Heero and Relena had a very strange relationship, and I just needed to stay out of it.

            Relena welcomed us warmly to her kingdom (even me!), and set us up in two of her guest rooms for the next two week.

            Spending all my vacation time in Sanc did not exactly appeal to me, but it was something that Heero had clearly wanted, so I went along with it.

            I found myself reading a lot of books while Heero and Relena ‘talked’.  It was really boring.  At least Heero had gotten a bit more independent in the last year and wasn’t clinging to me constantly.  Except maybe I would have welcomed a little clinging.  It’s nice to feel needed.

            Heero still crawled into bed with me at night, though.

            The hardest part about going to space was sleeping alone.  I’d gotten used to having Heero wrapped around me, his rhythmic breathing lulling me to sleep.

            “You know, Miss Relena gave us two rooms for a reason,” I teased him.

            “She doesn’t care,” Heero murmured into my neck sleepily.  “She thinks we make a sexy couple.”

            I snorted.  “I highly doubt that.”

            Relena and I expressed slightly less animosity towards one another now.  We’d both grown up.  We were no longer battling over Heero’s affections.  I think that Relena was happy with how her relationship with Heero had turned out.  Maybe there was a little regret, because, well, Heero was super hot, but she seemed to revel in being his friend and ear-talker-offer.

            Apparently she was also a total fag hag.  Her and Dorothy.  Which is something I didn’t discover until some of Heero and my more intimate moments.  Like while we were staying at Relena’s, settling in for bed, and Heero suddenly popped out with, “Duo, let’s make love.”

            “Heero.  What the actual fuck.”

            “What?”

            “Have you been reading romance novels or something?”

            “Yes.”

            “What?”

            “Relena thought they would be helpful.  For our love life.”

            “What the hell does Relena care about our… love… life…?”  I couldn’t help but blush at that last bit.  Heero and I didn’t actually have a love life because I always beat on him whenever he tried to take things further than a little grind ‘n’ grope.  That didn’t mean that I didn’t think about having sex with Heero.  Constantly.

            “She said the reason you won’t have sex with me is because I’m too aggressive,” Heero continued on, pressing his cheek to mine as he spooned me from behind.

            “Why does Relena know that we haven’t had sex?!” I sputtered out, but who was I kidding?  Everyone knew.

            “She said I needed to be more romantic,” Heero explained.  “And that I should stop saying that I want to fuck you.  She said it’s vulgar.  But then I said that you’re vulgar, so I don’t think you mind.  But then she pointed out that you’re shy.  And she said that-”

            “What the hell kind of conversations are you having with the goddamn queen of the world?” I interrupted him, not wanting to hear any more.

            “She started it,” Heero said.  “And Dorothy-”

            “Oh shit, please tell me you’re not having these kinds of conversations with Dorothy, too.”

            “Dorothy and Relena give me good advice,” Heero said, sounding defensive.

            “Good advice about how to get into my pants?”

            “Mostly, yeah.”

            “Well it can’t be that good if you still haven’t succeeded.”

            “Hm,” Heero said, and I realized that he was taking that as a challenge.  Damn me and my big mouth.

            Apparently Relena had fully embraced the fact that Heero was gay, moving on beyond her crush and happily becoming his best gal pal.  She loved hearing every detail of his life and giving him advice.

            So Relena had found a new way to be a pain in my ass.

            We headed back to Germany after the new year, Wufei all pleased because he’d found Heero a great apartment.

            I didn’t know how I felt about it, but I pasted on a fake smile and gently encouraged Heero to move out.

            “I don’t want to move out,” Heero informed Wufei, crossing his arms over his chest.

            “This apartment is in a great neighborhood, it’s near Preventers Headquarters, and the rent is less expensive than ours,” Wufei countered, crossing his arms over his own chest.

            “This apartment has Duo,” Heero said, wrapping his arms around me possessively.

            “Uh,” I said.

            “Your relationship isn’t healthy,” Wufei blurted out.  I don’t think he meant to.

            “How so?” I asked, prying Heero off of me.

            Wufei just glared at us both and stomped off.

            “I don’t want to move out,” Heero complained to me.

            “I think it could be good for you,” I said.

            “You keep the nightmares away,” he confided softly.  “And I like groping your ass before bed, it helps me sleep better.”

            “Get out,” I growled at him, suddenly feeling very protective my flat, skinny ass.  Heero actually had the nerve to tease me about my lack of an ass all the time, then say that it helped him fall asleep.  Jerk.  We couldn’t all have perfectly sculpted asses of the gods.

            “Duo,” he said, and there were those damn puppy dog eyes of his.  “I don’t know if I can go back… to living alone.”

            “Should we look for our own place together?” I asked, even though I knew that wasn’t a great idea.  We did need space from each other.  I just didn’t want it.  No, we didn’t need space.  Wufei was crazy.  Heero and I were perfectly fine.  Everything was wonderful and I wanted to curl up in my cramped twin bed with Heero every night for the rest of my life.

            Well, no.  We needed to buy a queen or something eventually.  But otherwise, the point still stood.

            “I’d like that,” Heero said, eyes looking into mine searchingly.

            I felt nervous and I didn’t think it was a good kind of nervous.  “Okay.”

            So Heero actually started looking for an apartment, with the idea that I’d be coming with him making him much more enthusiastic about the search.

            Then Wufei held a gun to his head and told him to get the fuck out.

            Well, okay, there’s a little chunk that goes in the middle.  But I don’t even like thinking about it, so I mostly just black it out of my memory.

            The thing is, Heero’s and my relationship was starting to progress more and more rapidly.  I just got freaked out sometimes, especially if he touched me suddenly or unexpectedly.  And then I’d punch him or, on one memorable occasion, bite him until he bled.

            Heero didn’t get particularly bothered by my attacks.  He usually just defended himself.  If I got particularly vicious, his eyes would get cold and I would suddenly find myself pinned down or somehow or other incapacitated.

            The mood would immediately cool after that, and Heero would lay his head on my chest and stare up at me with his big puppy dog eyes until I forgave him.  What I was forgiving him for was never brought up, but Heero knew.  Feeling helpless, feeling trapped by his superior strength… it touched something deep inside of me.  Something feral and dark and scared and angry and screaming and I tried to keep it buried, but it was bubbling closer and closer to the surface.

            Heero knew all this, but he was an insensitive dick who drank too much.  He thought about himself and what he wanted.  He wanted to have sex.  Immediately.  And he just kept getting more and more aggressive with me.

            I treated it like a joke.  Maybe that was my own fault.  I teased him that I was going to cut off his dick with my hunting knife (well, I didn’t say the jokes were funny).  I joked that he’d been reading too many of Relena’s romance novels.  I accused him of only wanting me for my sexy, assless body.  I always made it a damn joke, while the tension inside of me grew and grew.

            Then one night he drank way too damn much.  I was supposed to be leaving in a few days to head off to space, and this clearly displeased Heero.  I drank with him to keep him company and was pretty plastered myself.

            Wufei drove us home from the bar, giving us a rant about how Preventers agents should conduct themselves with more decorum.

            We continued drinking at home, playing stupid drinking games and laughing our brains off.

            Wufei told us we were idiots and bid us good night, slamming his door with more force than necessary.

            “We should go to bed, too,” Heero said.

            “I’m not tired,” I protested.

            Heero just grinned at me, stumbling off to our room.

            “Manwhore,” I said with a snort, following after him.

            We made out for a while, tongues twining in slow, lazy kisses.  I was content to just lay there on my side, my hand slowly tracing the smooth line of Heero’s hip.

            Heero was never content with such things.

            He was soon working my shirt up and off, and I felt very exposed.  He began kissing my neck, suddenly pinning me under him.

            It made me feel claustrophobic.

            “Heero,” I said, pushing lightly at his chest.

            His eyes flickered to mine.

            I gave a little shake of my head and he rolled his eyes, shifting back onto his side.

            It felt better, but now I was annoyed with him for being annoyed with me.

            Heero gave me a quick kiss on the lips, then slid down to my collarbone, giving it a lingering suck.

            Okay, so that was nice.  I’m very sensitive, and yeah.  It was nice.

            The mood was back, and I found my legs tangling with Heero’s so we could get closer.

            Heero was being merciless to my neck, and I was digging my nails into his back, and things were just going very nicely when he suddenly got very aggressive again, topping me and forcing my legs open.

            I frowned at him.

            He ignored me, going for my fly.

            “Heero,” I said.

            He undid the button and slid down the zipper.

            “Not tonight,” I said, shaking my head.  Sometimes we exchanged… mutual favors… but he was starting to piss me off and I wasn’t in the mood.

            He ignored me, sliding his hand into my pants.

            “What the hell, Heero!” I snapped, my voice rising as my nerves got more agitated.  “I told you to stop, so fucking stop.”

            “You’re leaving,” he growled at me.  “I want what’s mine.”

            “And I said no,” I snarled at him.

            “And I said yes,” he snarled back, and something about his expression made a knot in my stomach.

            “Heero, please stop,” I said quietly.

            He spread his palm over the front of my boxers and rubbed.

            I let out a whimper that I didn’t intend to make.

            “See, you want it, too,” he said, smiling and looking pleased.

            It felt good and it turned my stomach.  “Please stop,” I repeated, starting to feel panicked.

            Heero kissed along my jawline, making me shiver.

            He’d never not stopped before when I asked.  Well, not after I’d said please and made it clear I was not joking.

            “Let’s go all the way,” he suggested quietly, pulling at my pants to remove them.

            I shook my head, unable to vocalize my disagreement.

            He shifted his weight and tugged them over my toes.

            My breathing was coming out faster.

            Heero did not get it at all, and had looped his thumbs into the waistline of my boxers.

            He stopped being Heero at that moment.  As my shorts slid past my hips, he was a threat.  My fear shut down everything inside of me except for that one little instinct that kept me alive all these years.

            I don’t actually know what happened after that.  I came back to reality huddled in the corner of the bed, screaming hysterically while Wufei tried to calm me down.

            From what I’ve been told, I basically went for Heero’s throat and almost killed him.  He had a really nasty bruise there for a while, not that I ever saw it in person.  Anyway, my psychotic break sent Heero to his own special happy place, and he broke free from me and put me in a chokehold.

            Wufei had realized by this point that something wasn’t right, and for some reason decided to bring his gun with him.  The door was locked, so he kicked it down and came busting in with his gun pointed.

            Heero was ready to kill me, until Wufei screaming at him brought him back to his senses.  Heero immediately let me go, and I apparently scuttled into the corner of the bed, pulling a blanket over my head and screaming hysterically.  Heero felt completely helpless, trying to comfort me, which only made me more hysterical, while Wufei was pointing his gun at him and screaming at him to get the fuck away from me.

            Heero finally gave up and did as Wufei told him.

            Wufei gently eased the blanket from my head, which only made me crazier.

            Heero tried to stay lingering in the doorway, resulting in Wufei pointing his gun at him all the way out the front door, locking it behind him.  Then he came back to my hysterical ass self.

            “Duo, shhh.  It’s me.  Shhh.  I’m right here.  Please, Duo.  It’s all right.  I’m here.”

            I found myself being soothed by his words.  I peeled myself out of the corner and collapsed against him, Wufei catching me in his arms and holding me quietly.

            “What happened?” he finally asked when I was calm.

            “I don’t fucking know,” I answered.

            “Did he hurt you?”

            “I… don’t know,” I said, touching my neck.

            I cancelled my trip to space.  Well, more like Wufei cancelled my trip.  He tattled on me to Une, and suddenly I was on leave and had to go to therapy in order to come back to work.  Apparently Consulting Special Agents weren’t allowed to have bad days.  Or mental breaks, as the case maybe have been.  And apparently the price for almost crushing a co-worker’s windpipe was two weeks of being shrinked.

            I hate shrinks.  They ask stupid questions and say their sympathetic listening words, and it all doesn’t mean a damn thing.

            I didn’t say anything of use to the stupid shrink, and she didn’t seem so keen on putting me back on duty, but I didn’t give her any reason not to.  I’m good at faking it.

            Heero came over to get some of his things.  The sight of him knotted my stomach, and I ran off to the bathroom, locking the door behind me.

            He begged and pleaded for me to talk to him until Wufei told him to get the fuck out.

            I didn’t know what was wrong with me.  I was suddenly so paranoid and anxious.  I didn’t tell the shrink any of this, but I felt like I was losing my mind.

            I scheduled an appointment with Dr. Trowa.

            “Duo,” he said, looking me evenly in the eyes through the vid screen.  “Why are you afraid of sex?”

            “I’m not afraid of sex,” I scoffed.

            “Something happened to you,” he said matter-of-factly.

            “It did not,” I said.

            Trowa tried again the next time we spoke.  “Something happened.  On L2.”

            “Yeah, lots of shit happened on L2,” I said.

            “To you.”

            “Yeah, to me.  Do you know about the L2 plague?”

            “Duo, did someone rape you?”

            “Why the fuck does everyone think that?” I growled.  “No.  No one raped me.  I am in fact 100 percent the virgin advertised.”

            “Something happened.”

            “Nothing fucking happened.”

            I know I don’t usually lie.  And that when I do lie, I am in fact a terrible liar.  So of course Trowa didn’t believe me.

            I don’t know why I didn’t want to tell Trowa.  He knew all the nastiest parts of me.  There was nothing I needed to hide from him.

            The memory just didn’t want to come to the surface.

            It was Wufei who finally drew it out of me.

            “Duo!  Wake up.”

            I felt the scream dying on my lips as Wufei stood glaring down at me.

            “Hey, Wu,” I said, my voice cracking as I spoke.

            “You were having another nightmare,” he observed drily.

            “Oh?” I said.

            Wufei continued to glare, his expression clear to me in the dark.  I have awesome night vision.

            “You have woken me up every night for two weeks.”

            “Sorry about that, man.”

            “What the fuck did Yuy do to you?”

            “He didn’t do anything,” I muttered.  “Look, I’ll be quiet now, so you can go back to bed and get your beauty rest.”

            Wufei didn’t budge.

            I rolled over so my back was to him, pulling my blankets back up over my shoulders.  I’d kicked them off in my hysteria.  I’d always had nightmares, but they were usually quiet.  And they were usually my subconscious being an asshole.  Like oh look, there’s Solo and I’ve got the vaccine and I made it in time and I’m injecting it and then Solo slits my throat.  Weird shit like that.  A lot of ghosts and zombies.

            These nightmares were just blood and the stench of intestines.  And screaming.  Lots of screaming.

            I felt the mattress sink down.

            “Go away,” I said.

            “Duo, the psychiatrist signed off on you being fit for duty, but I strongly disagree.”

            “Are you gonna go and tattle to Une, again?”

            “Tell me about it?”

            “There’s nothing to tell.”

            Wufei let out a very exasperated noise.

            I let one out right back at him.

            “Duo…” he said hesitantly.  “I’m worried.  Please talk to me.”

            I sighed and turned around, peeking up at him through the hood of my sweatshirt.  “I’m fine.  I’ll… get over it.”

            “There are some things you never get over,” Wufei said gently.

            “Trowa is my therapist, and I don’t think he’ll be happy that you’re impinging on his territory.”

            “Trowa asked me to talk to you.”

            “Hn.”

            “I’ll listen to anything you have to say.  It won’t change the way I think about you.”

            “Whatever.”

            “Fine, then I’ll just stay here until you talk.”

            “Uh.”

            Wufei lay down next to me.

            “Wu, this is so awkward.  Please get out of my bed.”

            “No,” Wufei said, crossing his arms over his chest.

            “Wu…”

            “The scent of daisies makes me sick.”

            “Huh?”

            “If I smell them, I get dizzy.  Sometimes I throw up.”

            “Okay…”

            “Meilan…”

            I shut my mouth immediately.  Wufei had talked to me about his dead wife exactly one time before.

            “She asked me to take her to the field.  As she was dying.  It was filled with daisies.”

            I chewed on my bottom lip.

            “The scent… reminds me of my failure.  Reminds me of her.”

            I wanted to make a glib comment about just because he shared didn’t mean I was going to, but I knew I couldn’t say anything.  Not after Wufei had said all that.

            “Now tell me about your damn nightmares.”

            “It doesn’t work that way.”

            “Yes, it does.”

            “I killed a man.  When I was ten.”

            Wufei didn’t say anything.

            “That’s it.  That’s the story.”

            “We’ve all killed men, Duo.”

            “Yep, and that’s why we’re all fucked up.”

            “Duo.  There’s more to the story.”

            “I stuck my thumbs into his eyes and popped his eyeballs out.”

            “And why did you pop his eyeballs out?”

            I was quiet for a moment.  “He killed one of mine.”

            “Duo, we’ve all killed for those we love.”

            “I didn’t just kill him.”

            Wufei stayed quiet.

            My eyes focused on the muscles of his arms, studying them in the dark.  “After I blinded him, I cut off his balls.  I stuffed them in his mouth to shut him up.”

            Wufei didn’t seem to react at all.

            I reached out a hand, tracing over his biceps.  I examined the muscles through touch, pushing up his loose sleeve to continue my exploration.

            “I just started making cuts with my knife.  I think he fainted or something but I kept slapping him awake.  I was screaming the whole time, just cutting and cutting with my knife.  I split him open and I pulled out his guts.  There was blood everywhere.  But I just kept cutting.  He had to be dead, right?  But I just kept cutting…”

            Wufei’s breathing was the same, the tension in his body the same, and it soothed me.  My hand slid down to his wrist, running over his pulse.  I liked the steady thump of it.

            “Amelia was cute,” I said.  “She had the blonde curls and the big blue eyes.  She always carried this ratty teddy bear that her dead mother gave to her.  We knew something was wrong when we found it on the streets.  Then we found her body.  He just dumped her in the trash, ya know?  Like she wasn’t even a person, like she was jus’ garbage an’ I saw red.  I jus’... I jus’ jumped right into it without thinking.  I mean all the street kids knew ‘bout this dick face.  But he neva killed no one before and ya jus’ neva thinks itsa happen ta you, ya know?”

            I laid my head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat, feeling it in rhythm with his pulse.

            “He liked ta take pictures, ya know?  Naked ones.  He took ma clothes off an’ he just had this grin on his face, I wanteda vomit.  He liked boys better, ya know?  But girls sold more pics, so that’s why he took kids like Amelia.  I dunno why he killed her, though.  She was a sweet girl, notta vicious bone in her body, ya know?  No one shoulda hurt her, not eva.  Street kids gotta edge, ya know, but not her.  She stayed sweet an’ innocent an’ good an’ that’s why I hadta take care of her an’ I failed, ya know?”

            I traced my nail down his sternum over the cotton of his t-shirt.

            “It’s easy ta kill a man, but it’s hard, too.  I was scared, ya know?  When he pinned me down.  I dun’ like ta be scared, but I knew I hadta let him in close.  Let ’im think I was another victim.  I jus’ couldn’t stop cutting after I started.  His body was so big, ya know, pinnin’ me down.  I felt claustrophobic.  But I knew I hadta do it for Amelia, ya know?  Anothera mine that I failed.  But even worse, ya know what I did?  I hid ’er away.  I tried ta forget about her.  ’Cause of what I did.  Ta avenge her.  But I jus’ couldn’t let ’im getta way with it.  Ya know?”

            Wufei wrapped me into his arms.

            “I’m fine, Wu,” I said.

            Wufei just cradled me.

            I noticed the scent of blood.  I held up my nails.  They looked strange in the dark.

            “Don’t worry about it,” Wufei said, kissing the top of my head.  “Just go back to sleep, okay?”

            “Okay,” I agreed, letting the steady beating of his heart lull be back to sleep.

            I’d apparently clawed the fuck out of Wufei during our little story time, my nails caked with blood.  He cleaned me up the next morning, then let me disinfect the angry red cuts covering his arm and chest.

            “I don’t even remember doing this…” I said quietly.

            “It’s okay,” Wufei said.

            “It’s really not…”

            “You needed it.”

            “To rip you to shreds?”

            “You needed to let it all out.  Words weren’t enough.”

            “I’m sorry.”

            “Don’t be,” Wufei said, patting my shoulder awkwardly.  He sucked at comforting sometimes, but he tried.

            “Thank you,” I whispered hoarsely, focusing myself on cleaning up the rest of his wounds so I could keep it together.

            God, I was a fucked up person.


	14. Chapter 14

            Heero was not bothered by the fact that I almost crushed his windpipe.  He was slightly bothered by the fact that he had started choking me in return, but he was confident that he wouldn’t have killed me so he thought it was okay.

           I just couldn’t talk to him.  I couldn’t deal with him.  I was dealing with my own shit.  I wanted him with me, I missed him like crazy, but the sight of him filled my nostrils with blood and made my whole body shake.

            I was ordered into more therapy.

            At this point, the Preventers had grown exponentially from when I first signed on.  There were more rules and regulations, and I couldn’t get away with everything just because I had been a gundam pilot.  It wasn’t like when me and Trowa lost it on L2.  Man the Preventers were lax back then.  Not now.

            Heero and I both ended up being put on one month leave.  When I went back to work, I was in an assistant’s capacity for a month before I was allowed back in my full capacity.

            I felt stupid and embarrassed.

            I didn’t work through any shit with my psychiatrist, who I thought was the most useless person in the world.  I don’t do well with new people.  I worked through everything with Wufei and Trowa.

            Trowa said he’d been planning to come to earth anyway, but I knew he was in the middle of a run with the circus and that he was a lying shit.  Trowa was a good liar, though.  I was depressed enough to just smile and nod and accept his hugs.

            I got my shit together as best as I could.

            What it came down to was that I scared myself.  There was a part of me that wasn’t me.  And that part of me did some scary shit.  It popped a guy’s eyes out and ripped out his insides, it skinned a man alive, it tried to kill my boyfriend and would have succeeded if he wasn’t so much more freakishly strong than me.

            I started to wonder if I was fit to be a part of the world.

            Trowa and Wufei spent a lot of time convincing me otherwise.

            AC 201 was not a good year for me.

            By AC 202, I was ready for a change.

            “Maxwell, pick up your damn dirty socks before I shove them down your throat!”

            “I’m busy,” I said, continuing to play my video game.

            “How dare you!  How dare you!?  I am not your maid.  Pick up these damn socks, or I’m kicking you on the street!”

            “Funny you should say that,” I said, feeling my heart speed up as I pretended to focus more on my video game.

            “Why?  What is humorous about my statement?”

            “Well, ’cause you can’t kick me out if I’m moving out anyway.”

            Wufei was silent.

            My guy died in the game and I quickly started a new game.  I didn’t want to look at Wufei.

            “When?”

            I chewed on my lip.  “Next month.”

            “You’re going to L4?”

            “Yeah.”

            Wufei sat next to me on the couch.

            “You died,” he finally said.

            “Huh?” I said, suddenly focusing on the TV screen to see that my character had in fact died again and I was just slamming random buttons on the controller.

            “Clean up your damn socks,” Wufei said, knee bumping against mine before he stood up and walked away.

            “They’re not hurting anybody.”

            “They are killing my soul.”

            “That’s a fucking exaggeration.”

            “They stink.”

            Wufei was unhappy that I was moving, but he wasn’t mad about it.

            Heero was furious.

            “Heero, are you sober?”

            “Yes?”

            “Are you just saying that?”

            “…”

            Counting the duration of the silence, I decided that it meant that he was not just saying that and was in fact sober.

            “Can I come over?”

            “Yeah.”

            I drove over to Heero’s.  It was two weeks before I was leaving and I had to hurry the fuck up before he heard it from someone else.  If he had been more sober and less on drugs, he probably would have figured it out for himself.  He loved snooping on me.

            “Hi,” he said, grinning from ear-to-ear when he opened the door.

            A little smile tugged at my mouth.  It was Sunday afternoon and he actually was sober.  The only times I ever saw him sober outside of work were… never.

            But his smile was already fading.  “What?”

            “Huh?” I said.

            “You’re not happy.”

            I shrugged, forcing the smile harder.  “I’m fine.  Can I come in?”

            Heero stood aside to let me in, but he was frowning now.

            I went in and sat on the couch.

            “You want a drink?”

            “No!”

            Heero frowned at me.

            “Sorry,” I muttered.

            Heero sat across from me, clearly displeased.  “Are we having an intervention again?”

            “No,” I said.  “I have to tell you something.”

            “What, is it how much you hate me?  Or how disappointed in me you are?”

            “Actually, it has nothing to do with you,” I said, starting to feel annoyed despite my guilt.  Or maybe especially because of my guilt.

            “Then why do you need to tell me?”

            “Good point,” I said, rising to my feet.

            “Typical,” Heero muttered.

            “Fuck you,” I growled, moving to the door.

            Heero didn’t stop me, so I stomped my way downstairs.  I was strapping on my helmet and getting ready to leave when I thought about it.  I had to tell Heero.  I had to tell him now.  I sighed, dropping the helmet back onto my bike and dragging myself back up the stairs.  I knocked tentatively.

            Heero didn’t answer the door.

            “Heero,” I called, knocking again and ringing the bell.

            There was a long pause, then the soft sound of Heero approaching the door.  He opened it a crack.

            “Did you forget something?”

            “Yeah, to tell you that I’m leaving.”

            “I figured that out when you walked out the door.”

            There was a pause.  “No, I mean like I’m leaving the earth.”

            “Uh, okay.  Is there a reason you needed to tell me that?”

            I sighed.  “Heero.  Forever.  Well, maybe not forever.  But I’m moving to L4.”

            Heero looked absolutely crushed, which quickly turned to rage.  “Why the fuck… of all the stupid things you could do.”

            “How is it stupid?” I asked, crossing my arms over my chest.

            “Well, stupid people can only do stupid things.”

            “Because I’m so stupid.”

            “Yes, exactly.”

            “Okay, well it’s been great talking to you.”

            Heero slammed the door in my face, the prick.

            Imagine my surprise that night when I received a text from Heero.  I sighed, clicking on it to open it.

            ‘I’ve been thinking about you all night.  About how I want to touch you.  I would make you feel so good if you’d let me.’

            ‘Heero, this is Duo you dumbass.’

            He didn’t answer me back.  Manwhore.  At least it wasn’t very sexually explicit.  Did it even constitute a sext?

            I tried to put Heero out of my mind and focus on getting myself ready to leave.

            Of course Heero never let me forget about him.  Not since I had chased him down to the cabin and forced my way into his life.  Now I was stuck with him.  And you’d think I’d want to be stuck with him.  And well, yeah, I did.  I had just finally become mature enough to acknowledge that despite what I wanted, Heero was bad for me and I was bad for him.

            I was growing up.  It was kind of scary.

            I didn’t know how I could truly cut myself off from Heero.  The closest I had ever come to it was after the whole thing with Wufei and the gun.  And I’d really only been able to stay away from him because the sight of him scared the shit out of me at first, serving as a trigger to the fuckery of my past.  Also Wufei blocked all his calls, texts, and emails so I didn’t have to deal with him.

            Wufei finally let us talk again after my month of therapy had ended.  We texted each other.  Heero was confused.  He didn’t know what he’d done wrong.  I didn’t want to explain it.  He thought we could still be together.

            ‘Heero, it’s not possible for us.’

            ‘I love you.  You love me.  What more is there?’

            ‘I’m too fucked up for a relationship.’

            ‘We were happy.’

            ‘That doesn’t change the fact that I am batshit psychotic.’

            Heero just wouldn’t let it go.  And I didn’t want him to let it go.  I wanted to believe that we could still work out.

            Wufei had Heero come to the apartment before we started work again.  We wouldn’t be working together at all anymore, but we still might run into each other at the office.  Une’s last condition for me coming back to work was that I didn’t lock myself into bathrooms every time I saw Heero.

            Wufei answered the door, while I sat on the couch and anxiously frayed at the bottom of my t-shirt.

            “Duo?” he said, and I turned around to face him.

            He looked like shit.  I could tell he hadn’t been sleeping well.  He looked at me hopefully though, and made a move to come closer, but Wufei slapped a hand on his shoulder and held him back.

            “Hey,” I said.  The sight of him wasn’t triggering me anymore.  I was cured?  Ha, yeah.  Sure.

            “Hey,” he answered, and I knew he wanted to flip Wufei over his shoulder and jump all over me.

            I wasn’t quite up for that.

            “Sit,” I said, gesturing towards the recliner next to the couch that I was sitting on.

            He sat.  He kept giving me those damn eyes.

            I knew it was over.  “Heero, we can still be friends.”

            The pain and confusion on his face was plain for anyone to read.  It wasn’t Heero at all.  Usually I was the only person in the room who could figure out what his minute facial expressions meant.

            “But…”

            “I’m sorry.”

            “I don’t understand what happened.”

            “I don’t really either.”

            Heero tried to move closer, and Wufei yanked him back into his chair.  Heero moved to counter him, then took a deep breath and stopped himself.

            “This is just how it’s going to be now,” I said.  I was proud of myself for keeping my voice so steady.  Boys don’t cry, and all that shit.

            “Why don’t I have any say?”

            “Why are you making this so hard?”

            “I love you, dammit!”

            “I love you, too…”

            “Duo.”

            “Enough,” Wufei said.  “Duo, you’ve said what you needed to say.  Yuy, get out.”

            “Fuck you, Chang,” Heero snarled, making no move to leave.

            “Heero,” I said.

            Heero turned his sullen look on me.

            “I’ll talk to you later,” I said.

            Heero shook his head.  Then he got up, Wufei tracking his every movement, and left.

            It took a long time for Heero and me to rebuild our friendship.  And as you’ve seen, we didn’t actually do a very good job of it.  Heero was always waiting for me to take him back.  When I kicked his ass halfway to Sunday for trying to touch me, screaming at him that I didn’t love him anymore (a terrible and blatant lie), he finally seemed to concede defeat.  And then he became a manwhore.

           Who would have known that Heero Yuy would be so accomplished at having anonymous sex?  I mean, yeah, he was like the hottest guy I’ve ever seen in my life, but he was so damn awkward and people-hating.  But I guess all he needed was his hot body to bring all the boys to the yard.

            It made me sick to realize that he was sleeping around.  I was horribly, horribly jealous, but then, I guess I deserved it.  I’d dumped him, hadn’t I?

            Then he started acting weirder.  He missed work without calling in.  He had no lights because he forgot to pay the electric bill.  His pupils were too damn small.

            Everyone knew, but no one wanted to say anything.

            I couldn’t watch Heero self-destruct like that.  I remembered how suicidal he’d been after the wars.  He was Heero Fucking Yuy, savior of the whole goddamn earth sphere twice over, and hell if I was going to let him disappear into nothing.

            That’s when I really got back into Heero’s life.  I cleaned up his apartment (and he dared to call me a slob), I helped him pay his bills, and I drove him to work.  I made him hangover remedies and cooked him healthy meals even though I wasn’t the best cook.  I kept my mouth shut when strung out-looking boys wondered out of his bedroom in the morning.  I punched him when he tried to grope me.  I rubbed his back while he puked his guts out in the toilet.

            Heero was an asshole to me.  He constantly belittled me.  He told me about all his lovers and about how they were better than me.  He broke my heart every damn day, but I kept coming back for more.

            Then one day when I picked him up from a bar, pleasantly drunk and happy, he kissed me and I let him.

            It was the start of a very bad precedent.

            I allowed him one kiss.  Then he’d tell me he loved me and would try to get me into bed.  Then I’d stomp on his foot or give him a titty twister or something else painful and send him off to bed.  This became our new relationship.

            No one thought it was healthy.  They didn’t even know the details, but everyone could see the way we stood too close to one another, the way we were too familiar.  After Relena’s Christmas party and the whole Heero kind of hit me in the face and then Wufei knocked his lights out thing, I agreed to put some distance between me and Heero.

            It didn’t last.

            It never lasted.

            We were like two oppositely charged magnets, always being drawn back together.

            That’s why I had to leave.

            My life was my own.  I wanted to dedicate it to making up for all the shit I’d done in the past, not pining away for a drug addict alcoholic who hated me.  What was between us now was not something to profane with the word ‘love’.  Of course I’ll always love him.  But I think that love is for the boy who I met during the war all those years ago.  The broken boy hiding in a cabin in the woods.  The man that he’s become now… he isn’t the same person anymore.

            I can’t fix him.  I know that now.  So I’m moving on.

            The day before I leave, I have lunch with Quatre.  Things have been tense between us since the Trowa Thing.  But he’s still one of my closest friends, and I think that we can mend the rift between us.  We promise to email.  We exchange hugs.  I think that we will be okay.

            I go back to the apartment and have a bro-date with Wufei.  We make pizza together and watch terrible movies.  He teases me relentlessly, and I tease him right back.  He lets me hug him before we go to bed.

            Wufei has to go to work in the morning, so I take a cab to the spaceport after he leaves.

            Heero is waiting.  He is quiet and contrite, walking beside me as I head towards check-in.

            “I’m sorry,” he finally says, grasping my hand lightly to stop my forward momentum.

            “I’m sorry, too,” I say.

            “I’ll get sober,” he says quietly.  “I’ll do anything.  Just don’t go.”

            “Heero, you have to do those things for yourself, not for my sake,” I reply, squeezing his hand and kissing him on the forehead.

            “Damn it, you can’t just walk away from me like this!”

            “I have to,” I say, letting go of his hand.

            “I love you!” he says desperately, like that will change anything.

            “I stopped believing that a long time ago,” I say sadly, taking the handle of my suitcase in hand again.

            “I’ll never forgive you!” he hisses out like a curse.  “If you go, I won’t…”

            I keep walking, not turning back.  I think that if I do, it’ll be like that old story in the Bible.  I remember Father Maxwell relating in his strong, clear voice about how the woman turned back to look at the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and turned into a pillar of salt.

            I’d done what I could for Heero.  Now it was up to him.  He could choose destruction or he could choose salvation.  I couldn’t choose for him.

            I get on the shuttle and I blast into space.

            Trowa is waiting for me at the gate when I arrive.

            “Hey, Maxy.”

            “Hey, Bloomsy.”

            “Ready to go?”

            “I think so,” I say, wheeling my suitcase along behind me as I take the first steps into my new life.


End file.
